Gnocchi and Cream Puffs

I am not an incompetent person. As evidence I share two recently completed projects:

A closet, to replace my swaying, tippy Ikea clothing rack,



and some curved shelves that both remind me of my grandmother's kitchen and neatly fill an empty space.



Neither of these projects is flawless. In fact, I took particularly flattering photos. If you looked closely you'd see all sorts of mistakes - split wood, a bar that's keeping my slightly warped plywood straight, lots of spackle. But I don't really care about those things, because one of the best pieces of wisdom I ever heard was, "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing badly." Keeping that in mind has freed me up to attempt all sorts of things that might otherwise be too intimidating.

Too bad that doesn't work for food. And that's where I want to bring up the topic of gnocchi. Fun to eat, fun to say, but harder to make than it should be. It's boiled balls of dough, right? The Jews have a version, the Nebraskans have a version, the Germans do it and so do the Italians. Damn the Italians for making the hardest one, because of all those cultures I enjoy Italian food the most. I am part German, which may be why spaetzle (is all boiled dough fun to say?) and I are copacetic, but I really thought I could get the gnocchi down.

One of my problems is that I'm not a totally focused cook, and I think you have to be in order to cook really, really well. That's why there are professionals. That's also why you don't see restaurants teaming up with preschools - cooking with small children around is hard. Cooking really well is almost impossible. So this may be why the gnocchi didn't turn out. I probably interrupted my vigilance to read a book, put an outfit on a doll, do up a button, or find a shoe.

Which brings me to pate de choux, which is what you have to start with to make gnocchi according to Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Before you go down the road of wondering why I picked up the French cookbook when wanting gnocchi, remember that they share a border. It made sense. Unfortunately, it didn't make gnocchi. Instead, the result was a sort of potato soup. "It's good," my sweet husband said, dribbling sage butter over the gloppy mess as though it were just the way he liked it. "Mmmmm," he hummed, spooning up another bite, "the butter helps."

The butter didn't help enough, and I would not recommend allowing Julia Child to guide you through gnocchi. The next time I'm up for ricing potatoes through my mesh wire strainer then rolling each little ball before gently dropping it in a simmering pot, I'll go with some online recipe. By an Italian.

But enough of the failed gnocchi. To hell with them, really, because what we got out the leftover pate de choux were eight little cream puffs, and they were perfect.



I spooned the dough into a sandwich bag, bit off one corner, squeezed out sweet little mounds of gold onto some parchment paper and baked them. Then, we whipped some cream, made a little chocolate glaze (but not too much, so the girls would sleep) and ate them by the fire.

My girls licked the whipped cream bowl, too, because licking bowls, spoons and beaters is the best way - I think - to get someone to fall in love with cooking, and my guess is that their memory of the evening is one of perfection.

So to conclude, let's trust each region's contribution. Italy for gnocchi, France for cream puffs, Nebraska for dumplings, and so on. Some things - like gnocchi - are worth doing only if they can be done fairly well.