When I lived in Buffalo, I collided with a bunch of Italians.  You don’t meet an Italian, you collide with ‘em.  No how-do-you-do and talk about the weather.  It’s a swift flooding of opinion and passion.  I love Italians. 

I met them at a brunch they threw.  Was it Easter brunch?  I think so.  At any rate, brunching with Italians…you have died and gone to heaven.  No Hamburger Helper.  Yeah, any American foodie can go beyond Hamburger Helper.  But the feeling is different.  La dolce vita, indeed.

I have dreams.  Italy is in the top five.  A month over there would be ideal, traveling from city to city, town to town.  And only doing things of the senses. 

Of course I’d eat.  And cook.  I’d love a cooking class or two.  I’d eat out.  I’d also pry my way into a home, haha.  I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard.  I can charm without any need for language;-)

I’d listen.  I’d attend an opera at La Scala and try not to melt into a puddle on the floor.  Maybe I’d sing in a piazza for coinage.  Can I get arrested for that?

I’d look.  Take some pictures, absorb others in my mind.  Beauty is not fully seen through the lens, I believe.  You’re so busy capturing one moment as others pass you by.

Smelling would parallel tasting.  And diverge from it.  

And touch?  Mmm, I’m not THAT kind of girl.  I’d be too occupied with stuffing my face.

I love the language.  I love the way words roll off the tongue.  In studying voice, I’ve found it’s a most favorable language to sing openly.  French?  Too many vowels.  German?  Too many consonants.  Italian is pure and clean, yet melodic. 

The word I love most is gnocchi.  It starts off with that peanut-butter-stuck-on-the-roof-of-your-mouth feeling, then dwindles down to a cute little ee.  I love you, my little gnocchi.

The problem I have is connecting it to what it is.  I don’t know why.  I made this dish for the first time several weeks ago and kept wanting to call them pierogi.  Weird.  Pierogi are Polish dumplings.  But gnocchi are little piggies.  Y’know, piggy pierogi.  I’ve probably thrown you with my addled line of logic.  Somehow it makes sense to me. 

I made the pierogi (err, gnocchi) from a Lidia Bastianich recipe in the recent Bon Appetit issue.  It was butternut squash gnocchi, though the way I made it, I didn’t taste any of that in it.  It was a little bland dumpling.  The sauce made it better.  Mmmm, butter. 

I also had a little fit.  I always have fits any time I try something out, as y’all well know by now.  The problem was with the fork-tine rolling.  The ridges tended not to come out ridgy enough.

So I made them again today.  With roasted garlic.  I strayed from the recipe.  Of course.  I’m not very good with recipes.

In this gnocchi-making process, I’ve discovered the potato ricer.  It’s my new favorite thing.  I went down into my personal Williams-Sonoma, i.e. my mother’s cookware collectibles in the basement, and dug one out. It’s not new.  Wonderfully used.

It does its job superbly.  When you want to make mashed potatoes, use this.  You’ll save yourself a lot of hard work.  Plus it’s so satisfying to see those little potato worms come out.  Like squeezing a blackhead!

After mixing, it was time to knead and fork-roll.  Oh joy.  But it went smoothly…must’ve been the tortuous practice I already endured.

I did a little twist on Lidia’s recipe.  I made a butternut squash sauce with brown sugar, butter, parmesan, and salt. 

I boiled my piggies.  They rested on the bottom, floating to the top as they cook.  Such entertainment makes gnocchi a quintessential kid dish.  Oooh!  Aaah!  Look at that!

They were fished out.  And plated.  Nom nom nom.  Squeal.  Delizioso!