A gnocchi lesson from an expert!

Years ago I tried making gnocchi and they were  little hard wads and had no taste... totally disgusting. Recently I searched the Internet for the gnocchi recipe with the most favorable reviews and tried again...  Since I knew I had used too much flour last time...this time I used too little... They were passable but not anything like my friend's Cristina's yummy gnocchi... She invited us over Sunday to have a gnocchi lesson and dinner.  I arrived at her door with my yellow shirt, yellow apron and a big bouquet of daffodils (upper left) from my garden...eager student indeed...

Cristina and her husband Max are from Milan and so their cuisine is not the tomato sauces and pasta of southern Italy but the wonderful risotto, polenta and creamy sauces of northern Italy... Everything in their kitchen is made from scratch with great reverence for not only the cuisine but also for the quality of ingredients and for time-honored traditional  methods of preparation.

She laughed and shook her head when I told her my recipe called for an egg.... only in America would they put an egg in gnocchi.. She boiled the potatoes and peeled them and riced them piping hot onto a small pile of flour (about 3/4 c.) and a little salt and commenced to knead vigorously, adding additional flour as necessary... Cristina assured me that having the potatoes hot was the secret.. All during the kneading process the dough stayed very warm.

She kept working and kneading and adding flour until the dough was smooth, glossy and elastic... no longer sticking to her fingers.  Being able to see and feel the dough gave me an idea as to where I had gone wrong. And since it is only potatoes and flour combined, it is the technique that is critical. And once it was perfect she rolled it into long ropes and cut little pillows of dough and here Max became involved..

It was his job to artfully arrange the gnocchi on floured trays to freeze or refrigerate.  Max  is also an excellent chef and most of their dinners are combined efforts.. I like to watch them working as a team in their kitchen and love it when they revert to Italian as the pace intensifies  ...

When served, the gnocchi was light and perfect and was swimming in a rich Gorgonzola sauce. The dinner included not only gnocchi but pork loin with an apricot glaze and Max's wonderful zucchini and cheese casserole. It was finished off with Max making  zabaglioni cream served hot over fresh strawberries..    Dinner at their house is always eagerly anticipated and long remembered. They return to Milan often and return laden with delights not available here in the states.

So we had a lovely day of playing bridge followed by a fabulous dinner.  To make it even more perfect I went home with a large bag of frozen gnocchi and the  secrets necessary for me to try again.. I was feeling very blessed indeed.....

p.s.. as I typed this post I was nibbling on some little biscuits Cristina sent home with me.  They were very similar to biscotti but made with corn meal. I must have that recipe also.

Mother's helper or who chewed the lid off the glitter bottle?

Mother's helper or who chewed the lid off the glitter bottle? Does the name Morris pop right into you mind?  Well it should....

Came into the living room one day and a long trail of gold glitter  was on the rug along with an empty glitter bottle missing a lid....   Morris was innocently sitting on the couch with a gold nose...  Who Me?

I have no end of material to finish this CQ book  for my CQJP..  Some I will not even use since I intend this book to be read to my great-grandchildren.  I will leave out a page on his obsession with my bra and another page on his eagerness to consume anything dead and disgusting..

I have tried a few options for the cover for the peek-a-boo on this block but so far nothing has excited me so will think on it for a while and add it later...  BUT when there is a cover to lift up this is what will be seen...

The first thing my Wednesday "CQ-in-training gals" learned was to guard their supplies...

Stitching time is scarce...but I'm making great strides with overgrowth in garden... Sending DH off this am with a pickup load for our clean green program... Goldwork is still resting and I should finish CQJP this weekend... all detail stuff so brain is thinking ahead...  One of the next blocks I'll be getting is Barbara's with her aunt's vintage postcards as images...  I'm fourth in the rotation so there were only three choices left...

I'm going to go with the shoe with the holly in it....for two reasons...  First I like the simplicity of the image and second I just love what is happening with the patches... there's a lovely rhythm to it. Janet still has them but I know she will be sending them soon...

Also I need to think ahead on my Morris book for CQJP and print off enough images to fill a sheet of transfer fabric.  I hate wasting even an inch of that expensive stuff... In looking through photos for the next 2/3 months I ran across this fantastic photo for the last cover of the book..
If you look closely you will see they are watching wild turkeys gobble up the sunflower seeds.. May's block will be Morris and friends (skunk, porcupine and raccoon) and June will be Morris and Molly...and it will really be hard narrowing down choices for that block as I have so many great loving photos...

Hummer done and a little break.....

The hummer is done and the piece is being blocked while I take a little break from it. I revise what I said last post because you can see all the richness of the fancy fabrics when it is photographed.
I like seeing the patches behind the crazy "patchy" pattern of the leaves..

  The beads were 15s and that plus all the couching has given me eye fatigue... a good time to work outside and on my Morris block before I do the final finish work on this one..

 I am happy with this piece so far as it is always a pleasant surprise when what I envision and what emerges are in sync.... and it is definitely GOLD!!!!

Spring  has finally arrived in Spokane and I had my first hummingbird at a feeder yesterday..  A family of noisy raccoons  were at the pond at 5AM and woke the dogs...who went  into a barking frenzy defending the farm.  Not my favorite way to start the day... Molly had her turn making friends with a porcupine yesterday... Not too friendly though as luckily she got only a very few quills.

Finally!!!!

I didn't think I was EVER going to finish the leaves... the couching is so slow going... I certainly have developed an appreciation for the goldwork pieces which are all couching... But the leaves are done on this piece..well I might add or adjust a bead  or two...

The initial planning and subsequent stitching have all been focused on letting the lovely fancy patches show through and  I'm succeeding..  I think the best analogy is a brick wall behind a tree.. I wanted the design and the structure to work in harmony.. The patches are various shades of soft-white satin and brocade... They create a under-glow to the composition.  I scanned this so everything has a bluish tinge but even when I photograph it will be hard to capture.  You will have to take my word for it..... it IS working...  I just have a needle tucked in to establish the angle of the beak.

Now I can start on the hummer. I fiddled a bit with it in photoshop this morning.... It will be a combination of beads and  edmar stitching and I have the fabulous iridescent, teal-colored beads (15s) but I need some additional 15s for the ruby throat and since that means a trip to town it may be a while...

The very last step, and  I feel the most important, will be the couched tendrils which will pull it all together... Right now the flower is hanging out all by itself....