What is with me and beets? You ask.
What is this recent obsession with using them in strange applications? You wonder.
An early start on Valentine’s Day?
I wanted pink pasta. No, truthfully I am still looking to use up my beets in interesting ways. I have eaten them plain, braised, pickled, in chocolate cake, and now beets have fallen into gnocchi. I really wanted to utilize that unique coloring that I love into something that would be truly fabulous. I think this takes the cake. How fabulous they are, both taste and visually. Look at them! Lovely magenta dumplings! So bold on a plate, screaming to say, look at me at eat me!
With my new food mill a willing collaborator, I had to give these babies a try.
Step back. Food mill?
I know, it sounds very old fashion, right? Even D was a doubter (and now newly converted). For months I have been looking into purchasing a new potato masher. No joke, months. I take my kitchen purchases very seriously. I have been using an old pastry blender with wires that just don’t stick in place. (Poorly constructed.)
Debating between hand-held mashers, I could not bring myself to make the buy. Not enough uses for a single instrument that can cost a good deal for the style I wanted. Potato ricers are great, but they ultimately feel like giant garlic presses to me (they also do a lousy job pushing celeriac through I recently found out borrowing a friend’s). So after much contemplation I went with a food mill. Good not only for mashing or ricing potatoes, but will bring sauces and soups smooth, make applesauce, and somewhere down the road can make baby food or grandparent food (zing!).
So with my new food mill I pushed potatoes and beets through and out came what D exclaimed as the “Sweeney Todd Special.” Pot pies anyone? I am ecstatic I have this instrument.
Really, the beet in this recipe is so faint it is difficult to detect. Another great way to slip beets to the haters. I also think it’s a great way to get kids interested in vegetables. Forget slipping it into their food, how about letting them make pink pasta, black pasta (with sepia), brown (chocolate), you get it. I had fun, I’m sure a child would have even more. (And how rewarding to make something delicious the whole family can enjoy).
This recipe made a good deal of gnocchi, enough for two portions and plenty to freeze for later. The best part of gnocchi is that once it’s frozen, it just takes an extra minute or so in boiling water to bring to temperature. Easy, delicious and easy on the eyes. Make the beets a day before to cut some time off.
To make regular gnocchi, just remove the beets from the process and reduce the flour amount (or follow this link). Beets have so much moisture that a good amount of flour is needed to counteract the stickiness of the dough Alternatively, I could have used less beet, but I love how this gnocchi radiates (really, sort of radioactive).
Beet Gnocchi
Serving Size= 8-10 portions
Special equipment: box grater, potato ricer or food mill
2 large (I used 8 small) russet potatoes
2-3 beets
2-3 cups flour
2 eggs
2 teaspoons salt
pepper to taste
1) Snip greens from beets and boil until soft, 30-45 minutes. Remove skin under cold running water, set aside. Boil whole potatoes, skin on, until soft (do not puncture initially with fork). Work carefully and quickly with two towels to slip potato skin off (you want to rice the potatoes while still warm).
2) Working in batches, place potatoes and beets through the ricer and spread gratings over a cookie sheet to dry out as you work.
3) Create a mound with the potato and beet shavings. Add the flour, salt and pepper to the center and create a moat, cracking the eggs inside. Work and knead the dough together, adding more flour as necessary, until dough is no longer sticking to fingers. (As D said, until it looks like a giant
pancreas, see photo left).
4) Working in batches on a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into snakes a little thicker than the width of your thumb. Slice into 1-inch pieces. Finish shaping on a lightly floured cutting board and imprint with a fork (this helps hold the sauce and cook more evenly). Assemble, slightly apart, on a 
cookie sheet and freeze if saving some for later use (this keeps the gnocchi from forming one giant gnocchi). Transfer to freezer bag once frozen through.
To Cook: Boil salted water. Add gnocchi and cook 3-4 minutes, until gnocchi float to top, remove with slotted spoon.
Note: Use your gnocchi just like regular pasta, though in my opinion, stay away from tomato based sauces as this will just be a large bowl of reds. Light olive oil and Parmesan, cream sauces or pesto, work very nicely with these. More in the days to come.