Gnocchi with gorgonzola cream sauce
Tender gnocchi in a rich, tangy blue cheese cream sauce with wilted spinach and toasted walnuts, a classic Italian dish that feels like a night out.
- 25 min total
- 20 min hands-on
- Follow-a-recipe easy
- Serves 2
- About $3.60 a serving
- 780 calories
- Vegetarian
Dolly says: Read the steps once before you start. Everything goes smoother after that.
Ingredients
For 2 servings.
- 2 tbsp walnuts, chopped
- 1 tbsp butter
- ½ cup heavy cream
- ⅓ cup blue cheese crumbles, crumbled
- 1 package potato gnocchi, 16 oz
- 2 cups baby spinach
- 2 tbsp grated parmesan
From your pantry
- 1 tbsp salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper
Each serving has about 780 calories, 19 g protein, 84 g carbs and 42 g fat, and costs about $3.60 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No butter? Ghee works.
- No baby spinach? Kale or arugula works.
- No grated parmesan? Parmesan wedge works.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
Fill a large pot with water, add the salt, cover and over high heat.
Bring to a boil. It means heating a liquid on high until it’s fully boiling before you move on. A lid on the pot gets it there faster, which makes it a good moment to chop something.
How you’ll know: Big bubbles break all over the surface, and they keep coming when you lift the lid.
High heat
Toast the walnuts in a large dry over medium heat 3 to 4 minutes, shaking the pan, . Tip them into a bowl.
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Fragrant. Fragrant means cooking until you can clearly smell it, usually garlic or spices, often in about 30 seconds. That’s the moment the flavor is ready, just before it can burn.
How you’ll know: You can smell it from a step back, and garlic is pale gold, not brown.
Medium heatTimer: 3 min 30 sec
Dolly’s tip: Nuts go from toasted to burnt fast. Pull them the moment they smell toasty.In the same over low heat, melt the butter, add the cream and blue cheese, and stir 2 to 3 minutes, until the cheese into a smooth sauce.
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Melt. Melting means gently heating something solid, like butter or cheese, until it turns liquid. Low or medium heat keeps it from browning or burning.
How you’ll know: It’s smooth and liquid, and butter may foam a little but hasn’t turned brown.
Low heatTimer: 2 min 30 sec
Dolly’s tip: Blue cheese is strong alone but mellow and creamy in sauce. Keep it on low so it doesn’t split.Cook the gnocchi in the water until they float, 2 to 3 minutes, then lift them out with a slotted spoon straight into the sauce.
Boil. Boiling means heating a liquid until big bubbles rise and break all over the surface. It’s the fastest way to cook pasta, potatoes and eggs, because it’s as hot as water gets.
How you’ll know: Bubbles are breaking across the whole surface, not just at the edges, and steam is rising.
High heatTimer: 2 min 30 sec
Add the spinach and over low heat until it and the gnocchi are coated, about 1 minute.
Toss. Tossing means gently lifting and turning food so everything gets coated, like pasta in sauce or vegetables in oil. It coats every piece evenly without mashing anything.
How you’ll know: Every piece looks glossy or evenly coated, with no dry spots hiding underneath.
Wilt. Wilting means cooking leafy greens just until they go soft and collapse. Greens shrink a lot, so a big pile of spinach becomes a small handful, and that’s normal.
How you’ll know: The leaves turn soft and deep green and slump into the pan, usually within a minute or two.
Low heatTimer: 1 min
Serve topped with the walnuts, parmesan and pepper.
Plan this in Dollop, and get the grocery list
Dollop puts this dinner on a night that suits your week, lists only what you still need to buy, and walks you through each step while you cook.
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