First Attempt at Parisian Gnocchi - Taste Like Flour

robert.c.brown15

Hey All,

Today was my first attempt at Parisian Gnocchi. I used the recipe from the Le Pigeon cookbook as it called for 85grams of bone marrow mixed with 90 grams of butter and I had some bone marrow on hand. Plus, how could you go wrong with a bone marrow butter?

Anyway, the issue I have after I put them in boiling water and removed them once they rose to the top was that they taste like dense, gummy balls of flour. I have never made gnocchi before so I have no idea if this is approximately what they should taste like before I put them in a hot pan with garlic and butter, or they are way off.

I think I (obviously) put in too much flour. Except, the book called for 2 cups of AP flour and then in parentheses it said 250 grams. Well I have a scale and I know the importance of one, so I used it and measured out 250 grams. Continued with the recipe and since I don't have stand mixer I mixed in the eggs by hand with a wooden spoon. That sucked.

Everything seemed to turn out fine until I tasted them. I went on this site - http://www.convert-me.com/en/convert/cooking/ and it said 2 cups of flour was 198 grams. While I'm sure that website isn't the beginning and end of how much 2 cups of flour weighs, 52 gram difference is a lot.

Based on everything I've said, does it sound like the flour amount is wrong in this recipe? Or is there still hope for my Gnocchi? What good is using a scale if the measurements are wrong? Really frustrating.

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Matt_67991

Choux is traditionally equal parts water and egg, half as much flour and butter, so it looks like it might be a bit too much flour. Another issue is if you cooked it long enough. That normally reduces the floury taste. Did you?

robert.c.brown15

After bringing the water and marrow butter to a boil I reduced the heat to medium and added the flour. Then I stirred until it became a dough and lifted from the side and bottom of the pan. Then I continued to stir it for another minute on medium heat before putting it in a bowl and letting it cool for 5 minutes (that 5 minute cooling was from the book). In the book they have you put it in a stand mixer with a paddle but I didn't have that so I had to do it by hand as I added the 6 eggs and parsley mixture in 6 parts, waiting between each part before adding more of the it.

I measured the water using 1.5 cups instead of 375ml. Didn't realize 375ml equals 375 grams. So I was probably around 350 grams of water to 250 grams of flour. The marrow butter was 175grams. I didn't measure the eggs but there was 6 of them blended together with 2 loosely packed cups of parsley.

I went ahead and cooked 6 or 7 of them in a pan with hot butter, garlic, and lemon juice, and they really only tasted like the butter/garlic/lemon juice with a hint of flour. They were dense and doughy, not light and fluffy.

Edit: Should I have let them cook more in the boiling water? Most of them were floated on the top for about 1-2 minutes. Does that cooking make a huge difference in their density? Can I throw my gnocchi back in boiling water to save them?

Nicky_J_17040

you could probably try and salvage them by re-boiling them....it sounds like you did everything correct. They should not be dense though, they will have a lightly bubbled interior, almost hollow.

I wonder if the marrow was just too much?

Maybe try again simplified and if you want that marrow flavor, use it at the last minute on the pick-up and emulsify your sauce with it. just an idea.

I've made lots of Parisian gnocchi with this recipe:

(sorry it's not in metrics)

1 1/2 cups water

6 oz. butter, cubed small

1 TBL salt

2 cups ap flour

2 TBL dijon mustard

whatever herbs you choose

1 cup gruyere or parm

5-6 whole eggs

bring water butter and salt to a light boil, remove from heat and add flour all at once.

return to med heat and continue to stir until that pasty layer forms on the pan. put into mixing bowl.

then let cool for a few minutes, add mustard,herbs, cheese and eggs one at a time.

put into piping bag and let rest for about 10-20 minutes. pipe into boiling salted water by

cuttiing into 3/4" x 1/2" cylinders. allow to float and remove after 2 minutes or so. toss in a bit of oil.

Let cool, then proceed to sear......

robert.c.brown15

Yeah that is Keller's recipe. I don't think the marrow would be a problem because instead of having 6 oz. of butter, I had 3 oz. marrow combined with 3 oz. of butter. It melted in the water with no problem. I think I should have just followed his proportions of water and flour and use the marrow butter instead of the normal butter. it would have probably worked out fine.

One other thing was for the Le Pigeon recipe I had to blend parsely and the eggs together. Would that affect anything? I don't think i overblended them and the parsely was equally distributed. It was a nice bright green and then I just poured the mixture into the dough, in six portions.

Thanks for the info about reboiling them. I'll try it this weekend. They were definitely not almost hollow on the inside.

Nicky_J_17040

you know Keller! Great recipe.

I don't think the parsley/egg mix would affect anything.

Let me know how it works for you. It sounds like you got a good hold on it.

robert.c.brown15

Ha, yeah Keller basically taught me how to cook (through his books, not personally, that would have been much cooler). I recognize a lot of his recipes by sight. Whether that is good or not I don't know, but he has yet to let me down. As opposed to this Le Pigeon recipe. I bet if they didn't list the 250grams for flour and just kept it at 2 cups I probably would have been fine. Thank you!

ejf12009

Note that 2 cups AP flour should really be more like 260, 280g...a standard measurement is 140g/cup.

robert.c.brown15

That's interesting. That website I listed must be way off then. I checked it with the Khymos Excel sheet I have and it did say 2 cups is 280 grams. Now I really don't know what happened.