I was sure that, not only had I ordered ricotta during my weekly online shop, but that I had unpacked it and placed it in the fridge when the groceries arrived so you can imagine my surprise when, as I got organized to cook this, I discovered that there was no ricotta. The original recipe called for only 1/2 cup so I substituted mozzarella, of which I had plenty. Feel free to use the proper ingredients in the original recipe; I have left the title of this post as is despite my alternate ingredients so as not to confuse people who come here directly from the weekly menu post. The version with ricotta will definitely be lighter than the version I have created. While I was substituting ingredients, I also decided to omit the Parmesan (I always feel that Parmesan and vinegar in conjunction are very reminiscent of sick); I was more interested in the sour aspect of this dish than the cheesy one. I don't like nutmeg with beets so that went out the window as well.
I didn't feel like waiting the hour it would take to roast the beets (and had basically been too busy/disheartened by various recent unproductive job interviews to plan this step ahead) so I just washed the beets really well and grated them finely on a box gratter. I figured that they would cook while the gnocchi did and, if they didn't cook all the way through, would add a little textural element to the gnocchi. (Should you chose to follow my method of grating raw beets rather than baking them, I cannot stress enough the notion that you must protect yourself and your workplace before grating; my kitchen counters looked as though an episode of Dexter had just been filmed there. Your hands will get red so use plastic gloves or impale the beets on a fork prior to grating though, to be fair to beets, I did none of the above and 99% of the beet dye washed right off.)
In keeping with my laziness in not baking the beets first, I also decided not to roll out the gnocchi and then cut them but but to drop them - free form from a spoon - onto a plate of flour in which I rolled them and then plunk them into boiling water. Should you want properly shaped gnocchi, follow the instructions set out in my recipe for carrot gnocchi or follow directions in the recipe linked below.
Recipe:
2 large beets, well scrubbed and washed, skin on
1/2 cup grated mozzarella for gnocchi + 1/2 cup for finishing the dish
1 egg
1 1/2 - 2 cups flour + 1/4 cup for rolling the finsihed gnocchi prior to cooking
1/4 tsp ground fennel seed
1/4 tsp ground pink pepper
1 clove garlic, crushed
2 cups blanched Swiss chard (or rainbow chard or beet greens)
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp Balsamic vinegar
1 tsp red wine vinegar
Salt to taste
Grate the beets into a large bowl. Add the grated cheese, the fennel, the pink pepper, 1/4 tsp salt and the egg. The consistency of this mixture will give you a better idea of how much flour you are going to need because all beets have different amounts of juice when grated, eggs vary in size, etc.
Start by adding 1 cup of flour and work your way up - a 1/4 cup at a time - until the dough comes together into a ball. It will be a soft dough but wil hold its shape. Refrigerate for an hour to let the gluten rest and the dough to firm up.
Boil a large saucepan of water; salt it as you would water for pasta. Once teh water has come to a rolling boil, add the gnocchi and cook until they rise to the surface of their own volition. Regular gnocchi will take just a few minutes but my golf ball sized free formers took closer to 7.
While the water for the gnocchi is heating up, heat the 2 vinegars in a small saucepan together over low heat and boil until reduced and syrupy, about 10 minutes. Quite frankly, you can skip that step and just drizzle the Balsamic vinegar over the dish omitting the red wine one completely but I like less sweet and more sour so added this extra step. Up to you and your taste buds.
While all this is going on, add the garlic and oil to a pan and heat over low heat until the garlic is fragrant and golden. Add the greens and heat through. Salt lightly as your gnocchi are already salted (as is the water that they cooked in).
By this time your gnocchi should be cooked. Drain them (a large slotted spoon is easier in this case than a colander) and add them to the pan that holds the greens. Shaking the pan from time to time in order to keep the gnocchi from sticking, gently mix the gnocchi with the greens. Add the remaining grated mozzarella and continue to shake the pan occasionally until the cheese is melted.
Serve drizzled with the vinegar reduction and eat at once. The result was not attractive at all (though definitely prettier and les raw meat looking than the photo above) but very delicious.
Recipe inspiration, here.