Gnocchi with Gorgonzola and Spinach
Potato gnocchi 500g (£1.49)
Gorgonzola/blue cheese 200g (£2.39)
Frozen chopped spinach 100g (£1.15)
Double cream 300ml (95p)
Parmesan
Black pepper
£5.98. Serves three.
Boil the gnocchi in a saucepan for two minutes or until they float to the top. Drain so the gnocchi is as dry as possible and layer around the clumps of frozen spinach in a ceramic dish. Dice the blue cheese into cubes and evenly distribute throughout the dish. Pour in the double cream so that the top layer of gnocchi is partially submerged. Shave parmesan and add black pepper to taste.
Bake in the oven at 175 °C for around 25 minutes. Serve immediately with a light green salad.
Some notes with regard to ingredients. I don’t like fresh gnocchi. Get the normal stuff. The Italian Del Ugo brand is good and cheaper than supermarket own brands, has a use by of over a month as well. £1.15 will buy you a kilo of frozen spinach of which you will use about 100g, just keep the rest in the freezer. Gorgonzola is creamier than stilton but personally I find that a lot of supermarket gorgonzola lacks maturity and is generally quite unremarkable. For a nice strong flavour go with stilton as in this case roquefort would be really quite overwhelming.
If you are able to venture away from the supermarkets a good gorgonzola remains my first choice. If you have the time I’d strongly suggest making a detour down Jermyn St and popping into Paxton & Whitfield – they have an excellent selection and extremely knowledgeable staff. Local cheese shops are disappearing but there are notable exceptions; Bloomsbury Cheese and La Fromagerie spring to mind. Failing that, Whole Foods Market in Kensington has a broad selection and its in a convenient location. Their strathdon blue would work well.
Parmesan is perhaps an optional extra. I often add it if I’m unconfident in the supermarket blue I’ve picked up but its probably superfluous if you’ve got something good. Some recipes call for pancetta but I think it can ruin the essence of this; the addition of pancetta doesn’t really serve much purpose other than to exclude vegetarians. The beauty of this dish is that the strong, meaty quality of the blue cheese is guaranteed to satisfy even the staunchest red-blooded meat eater.
This is such a simple dish and cheap dish to make that there is really no reason not to give it a go. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, the standard of this dish at a lot of restaurants is shockingly low. Don’t be put off. They may think tepid butter water constitutes a good blue cheese sauce but that doesn’t mean you should.
Ingredient prices from ocado.com
