Recipe Courtesy of Joseph Cicala of Le Virtu
Smoked potato gnocchi
Ingredients:
- 3lbs russet potatoes
- 2.5cups ap flour
- 2 eggs
- pinch salt
- 1/4 cup olive oil
Directions:
- Boil the whole potatoes until they are soft (about 3- minutes). While still warm, peel and place over a stove-top smoker filled with juniper or hickory wood chips.
- smoke for 10 minutes
- pass through vegetable mill onto clean pasta board.
- Set 8 quarts of water to boil in a large pasta pot and add 3 tablespoons of coarse sea salt and bring to a boil.
- Make well in center of potatoes and sprinkle all over with flour, using all the flour.
- Place egg and salt in center of well and using a fork, stir into flour and potatoes, just like making normal pasta.
- Once egg is mixed in, bring dough together, kneading gently until a ball is formed. Knead gently another 4 minutes until ball is dry to touch and pulls away from the table neatly.
- Roll baseball-sized ball of dough into 3/4-inch diameter dowels and cut dowels into 1/2 inch long pieces.
- Flick pieces off of a fork, gnocchi board, or concave side of cheese grater to form a concaved dumpling. Drop these pieces into boiling water and cook until they float (about 1 minute).
- In a medium sauce pan add your lamb ragu with a touch of butter and 3 oz of pasta water. bring to a simmer.
- Remove the floating gnocchi from the boiling pasta water and add them into the simmering ragu. Cook for an additonal 30 seconds to a minute until the sauce has absorbed into the pasta.
- Toss with grated Parmigiano Reggiano and serve.
Lamb Ragu
Ingredients:
- 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 2 bay leaves
- 1/2 tsp ground cloves
- 1 carrot, finely, diced
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 1 rib celery, finely diced
- 1 clove garlic, sliced
- 2 pounds lamb shoulder, ground
- 2 sprigs rosemary finely chopped
- 1/4 pound pancetta or slab bacon, ground
- 3 cups tomato puree
- 1 cup dry red wine
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- Parmigiano-Reggiano, for grating
Directions:
- In an 8-quart, heavy-bottomed saucepan, heat the olive oil and butter over medium heat.
- Add the ground pancetta, bay leaves, cloves, onions, carrots, celery, and garlic and sweat over medium heat until the vegetables are translucent and soft and lightly browned, about 10 to 15 minutes.
- Add the ground lamb and chopped rosemary and stir into the vegetables.
- Cook the meat over high heat, stirring to keep the meat from sticking together until well browned.
- Add the red wine and reduce.
- Add the tomato puree and simmer over medium-low heat for 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
- Season with salt and pepper, to taste, and remove from the heat.
