$3.99
Gnocchi Board
The old Italian way to hand form those delectable grooved potato dumplings.
Made
in Italy
Makes 6 servings
Ingredients:
3 large Idaho or russet potatoes (about 1 3/4 pounds), scrubbed
1 large egg
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground white pepper
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, or as needed
Directions:
Place the potatoes in a large pot with enough cold water to cover. Bring the
water to a boil and cook, partially covered, until the potatoes are easily
pierced with a skewer but the skins are not split, about 35 minutes.
(Alternatively, the potatoes can be baked in a preheated 400 degree Fahrenheit
oven until tender, about 40 minutes).
Drain the potatoes and let them stand just until cool enough to handle. (The
hotter the potatoes are when they are peeled and riced, he lighter the gnocchi
will be). Working quickly and protecting the hand that holds the potatoes with a
folded kitchen towel or oven mitt, scrape the skin from the potato with a paring
knife. Press the peeled potatoes through a potato ricer. Alternatively, the
potatoes can be passed through a food mill fitted with the fine disc, but a
ricer makes fluffier potatoes and therefore lighter gnocchi. Spread the rice
potatoes into a thin, even layer on the work surface, without pressing them or
compacting them. Let them cool completely.
In a small bowl, beat the egg, salt, pepper and nutmeg together. Gather the cold
potatoes into a mound and form a well in the center. Pour the egg mixture into
the well. Knead the potato and egg mixtures together with both hands, gradually
adding the grated cheese and enough of the flour, about 1 1/2 cups, to form a
smooth but slightly sticky dough. It should take no longer than 3 minutes to
work the flour into the potato mixture; remember, the longer the dough is
kneaded, the more flour it will require and the heavier it will become. As you
knead the dough, it will stick to your hands and to the work surface: Repeatedly
rub this rough dough from your hands and scrape it with a knife or dough scraper
from the work surface back into the dough as you knead.
Wash and dry your hands. Dust the dough, your hands, and the work surface
lightly with some of the remaining flour. Cut the dough into six equal pieces
and set off to one side of the work surface. Place one piece of dough in front
of you and pat it into a rough oblong. Using both hands, in a smooth
back-and-forth motion and exerting light downward pressure, roll the dough into
a rope 1/2 inch thick, flouring the dough if necessary as you roll to keep it
from sticking.
Slice the ropes into 1/2 inch thick rounds. Sprinkle the rounds lightly with
flour and roll each piece quickly between your palms into a rough ball, flouring
the dough and your hands as needed to prevent sticking. Hold the tines of a fork
at a 45-degree angle to the table with the concave part facing up. Dip the tip
of your thumb in flour. Take one ball of dough and with the tip of your thumb,
press the dough lightly against the tines of the fork as you roll it downward
the tips of the tines. As the dough wraps around the tip of your thumb, it will
form into a dumpling with a deep indentation on one side and a ridged surface on
the other. Set on a baking sheet lined with a floured kitchen towel and continue
forming gnocchi from the remaining dough balls. Repeat the whole process with
the remaining pieces of dough. At this point the gnocchi must be cooked
immediately or frozen.
Bring 6 quarts of salted water to a vigorous boil in a large pot over high heat.
Drop about half the gnocchi into the boiling water a few at a time, stirring
gently and continuously with a wooden spoon. Cook the gnocchi, stirring gently,
until tender, about 1 minute after they rise to the surface.
In business since 1984 family owned and operated! Proud to offer our
AeroPress Coffee maker.
Some praises
of AEROPRESS™:
"It
makes the absolute best cup of coffee I've tasted in my entire life." Lewis Singer - Cooks Junction
"When
used properly, AeroPress produces a remarkably good straight espresso and
an excellent Americano-style taller cup. In fact, it produces a better
espresso shot than many home machines that cost twenty or thirty times as
much." Kenneth Davids – Author of: Coffee: A Guide to Buying Brewing and Enjoying
Espresso: Ultimate Coffee
Coffee Roasting: Romance and Revival
editor of coffeereview.com
"Thank
you for leaving us an Aeropress. I'm sipping a delicious Americano as I go
through my emails--you have saved me from servitude to the office brew cup
and I will be forever grateful! The funny thing is, I made it with the
same pre-ground coffee the drip stuff is made of (just to do a more direct
comparison) and, well, there is no comparison--one has flavor, the other
has bitterness." Molly Watson - Sunset Magazine
"I
didn't know the same coffee could taste so good." Peter Whitely - Sunset Magazine
"This
is the first cup of coffee I've ever enjoyed without cream and
sugar." Margie Gray – Professional Engineer and coffee lover
"Thus,
the result with hardly any tinkering: Two very, very good mugs of coffee.
I was able to taste qualities that I had mainly read about before,
particularly on the floral, fruity, and sweet end of the spectrum. You've
obviously made a fine discovery." Jeffrey Steingarten - Vogue Food Editor
Comparison
of brewing methods:
Drip
Brewing:
Drip
brewing passes water through a bed of grounds. When the water first
drips into the bed, it is too hot and bitterness is extracted. As the
water filters downward through the bed, it becomes too cool and
extraction is weak.
The water doesn't contact all of the grounds uniformly. Grounds at the
edge of the bed are under-extracted, while grounds at the center are
over- extracted and contribute bitterness.
Total
immersion of the grounds in the AEROPRESS
completely solves these problems. All of the grounds contact the same
water temperature, and the brewing process is short and sweet. The
gentle air pressure of the AEROPRESS also
extracts extra flavor from the coffee. Ordinary drip brewers leave a lot
of flavor in their soggy grounds.
The drip
method cannot make a robust single cup because the small amount of water
doesn't heat the bed enough for rich extraction. It is also slow. AEROPRESS
makes one to four servings with a single pressing in less than a minute.
The flavor is equally rich for any number of cups.
The
lengthy wet time of drip brewing also extracts bitterness from the
grounds.
In their
2005 edition of America's Test Kitchen Live, the editors of
Cook's Illustrated Magazine wrote:
"Drip
coffee machines make coffee easily, but rarely well -- often producing
a burnt and bitter liquid reminiscent of stale truck stop
coffee".
Finally,
drip brewers cannot make espresso or lattes.
Espresso
Machines:
Most
coffee lovers agree that espresso is less bitter than drip brew because
of the shorter brewing time. However when we ran comparison taste-tests
in the homes of espresso lovers, they all agreed that AEROPRESS espresso
tasted better than the brew from their high-priced European espresso
machines -- why? The reason is that the total immersion brewing of the AEROPRESS
yields a robust flavor at lower temperature -- and lower temperature
brew is far less bitter. Home espresso machines don’t allow adjustment
of temperature. But even if they did, their lack of total immersion
would not yield robust flavor at reduced temperature.
In
addition to smoother taste, the AEROPRESS has
several other advantages over conventional espresso machines.
Grind is
not critical in the AEROPRESS. Grind is so
critical in espresso machines that most grinders cannot produce a
grind fine enough to make a good tasting shot! Special espresso
grinders cost hundreds of dollars and require frequent cleaning.
Espresso
experts always adjust the grind when there are changes in humidity or
batches of coffee. They throw away two or three shots while adjusting
the grind in to achieve the desired 25-second shot.
There is
no tamping in the AEROPRESS. Books on
espresso teach the art of just the right amount of tamping. They
instruct the home barista to practice on the bathroom scale to learn
exactly thirty pounds of pressure.
There is
no pre-warming of the portafilter head. In fact the AEROPRESS
has no portafilter head!
There is
no maintenance. Espresso machines require regular cleaning and
descaling with caustic chemicals. They also require disassembly and
cleaning of the showerhead.
There is
no need to judge when to stop the pull. This is the most critical
skill in using an espresso machine. As espresso lovers well know, most
would-be baristas in coffee shops, hotels and restaurants run the pump
too long -- extracting sour bitterness from the grounds.
With the
AeroPress, the amount of water is predetermined by the user, who can
brew any strength from weak to super-intense just by choosing the
desired amount of water prior to pressing.
Pod
Brewers:
Many
single-cup pod brewers have come to market recently. Some of these
machines make American coffee. Others make espresso. They range in price
from about $60 to several hundred dollars. The December 2004 issue of
Consumer Reports Magazine tested the three most popular pod brewers and
reported the flavor as "mediocre at best".
There are
also many negative reviews on internet discussion groups. For example
two reviews of American-cup pod brewers at coffeeforums.com:
"I
tried everything I could to like the taste of the coffee, but I
couldn't".
"I'm
still not liking my own coffee made in this machine. So far it tastes
awful".
We've
studied pod brewers and find that they have a number of inherent
limitations, with no solutions in sight:
The
coffee and the water do not mix adequately; resulting in insufficient
extraction of flavor.
The pods are normally six or more months old when used. By that time,
they have lost much of their flavor.
The pods
are expensive. Each cup costs more than twice as much as brew made
from premium loose coffee.
Most
espresso and latte drinkers want a double. The pod espresso machines
only make singles. The American-cup brewers cannot make an espresso
and thus cannot make a latte.
A
limited selection of coffee variety frustrates coffee lovers who want
to try various blends.
French
Presses:
People see
some similarities between the AEROPRESS and a
French Press. Both use total immersion and pressure. But the
similarities end there.
The filter
in the French Press is at the top of the mixture. Because coffee floats,
the floating grounds clog the filter and makes pressing and cleaning
very difficult. Users are instructed to use only coarse ground coffee.
But this reduces the amount of flavor that can be extracted from the
coffee and necessitates long steeping times which extract bitterness.
Furthermore,
even coarse ground coffee includes many fine particles. These small
particles pass through and around the filter resulting in a bitter,
gritty brew. The particles in the brew continue to leach out bitterness.
Consequently French press users are advised to drink or decant the brew
immediately. Also, some particles clog the filter screen making pressing
and cleaning very difficult.
AEROPRESS
coffee is micro-filtered. It so pure and particle-free that it can be
stored for days as a concentrate. The concentrate can be drunk as
espresso, mixed with milk for lattes, or diluted to make American
coffee. French presses cannot make espresso or lattes.
Finally,
cleaning the French press is quite a chore. The AEROPRESS
chamber is self-cleaning. A ten-second rinse of the plunger is all
that's required.
In addition
to producing superb flavor, the AEROPRESS offers
other advantages over existing coffee and espresso makers:
It is
inexpensive. Retail price is $30.
It is fast
and easy to use.
It makes a
single cup just as hearty tasting as four cups.
Because of
the lower temperature and short brew time, the acid level of the brew is
much lower than conventional brewers. Laboratory pH testing measured AEROPRESS
brew's acid as 19% (less than one fifth) that of regular drip brew. The
low acid is confirmed by coffee lovers who report that AEROPRESS
brew is friendlier to their stomachs.
It takes
up very little space in a kitchen.
It is
portable and suitable for travel, camping and boating as well as the
kitchen.
AEROPRESS
is the result of several years of applied research by inventor/engineer
Alan Adler. He conducted numerous brewing experiments, measuring the brew
with laboratory instruments. The experiments demonstrated that proper
temperature, total immersion and rapid filtering were key to flavor
excellence. He then designed and tested dozens of brewers before settling
on the AEROPRESS design. The design was further
validated by coffee lovers who tested prototypes in their homes. Adler has
about forty U.S. patents and an equal number of foreign patents. He is
President of Aerobie, Inc, Palo Alto, California and a lecturer in
mechanical engineering at Stanford University. Adler's best-known
invention is the Aerobie flying ring which set the Guinness World record
for the world's farthest throw (1,333 feet).
