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1 février 2018
Associating buckwheat, goat cheese & spinach always do wonders, either in tarts, lasagnas, or gratins like in this spinach, goat cheese & buckwheat gnocchi gratin. Lately, I was definitely in need of a dish that is able to stick to the body like this one. I was full of doubts about trying to make buckwheat gnocchi, mostly because I was afraid to not obtain the desired texture of classic gnocchi. At the end, the difference is barely perceptible and I enjoyed eating my gratin for work lunch breaks.
I included the spinach, goat cheese & buckwheat gnocchi gratin to my weekly meal prep’, among other things like salad, sourdough bread, almond butter or chia pudding for my breakfasts. The perks of trying new recipes for the blog during weekends is that they go directly into the dish list that will help me to go through the week without eating like a mess. I’ve already vaguely talked about meal prepping in my previous posts, but this year I started to stick to it more seriously than ever before. Because of a matter of eating well, saving money, but most of all saving a huge amount of time on weekdays. You get this one, it can seems quite constraigning at the beginning as prepping meals in advance also requires some time on the weekend, but if you’re well organised you won’t need more than 1 or 2h to prepare something decent for the whole coming week, without having to spend time cooking anymore on weeknights, excepting for reheating or stirring together the different elements you’ve prepared.
Even though those little habits are overly satisfying once you get used to them, I can’t stop seeing also the necessity for me to apply them if I actually want to have a chance to manage all I want to do. Even if I don’t want to believe it, maybe that’s what adult life is supposed to look like: having to schedule even the small details to be able to cope with work, workout, hobbies, social and sentimental life all at once, without having to dream about 30h long days to succeed. So if I have to feel myself like a control freak when I plan my food while trying to get convinced that I’m a responsible adult, at least I still manage to find some rare moments out of time during the week, thanks to those details.
For this spinach, goat cheese & buckwheat gnocchi gratin, I deliberately chose to make a slightly ligter béchamel sauce. Well at least before to add all the cheese into it. Goat cheese brings a sour flavour to the gratin and add some peps to the gnocchi. If you don’t want to use all the béchamel in one shot, you can store some in the fridge to eat later during the week, in a croque-monsieur or some egg casserole for instance.
More recipes with Gnocchi:
Spelt & wil garlic nocchi
Ingredients
- 100g buckwheat
- 350g potatoes
- 1 egg
- Salt
- 500ml goat milk
- 30g flour
- 100g soft goat cheese
- 100g goat tomme
- 1/4tsp nutmeg
- One pinch of salt
- 70g fresh spinach
- 50g goat tomme
- 1 small red onion
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1tbsp oregano
- 1tsp paprika
- 2tbsp olive oil
- Salt & pepper
Instructions
- 1. To prepare the buckwheat gnocchi: boil peeled potatoes in some slightly salted boiling water until they get tender. Once done, set aside to cool down. Mash with a fork then stir with flour. Salt and add egg to the mixture. Stir well and let rest for 30 minutes.
- 2. To prepare spinach: heat olive oil in a frying pan. Add garlic and finely chopped onion, as well as oregano. Salt and pepper. Add cut spinach to the pan, then sauté for1 or 2 minutes. Cool down in the pan.
- 3. When gnocchi dough has rested, slightly knead it on a floured surface and separate into 2 pieces. Shape 2 cylinders of 2cm diameter, then cut 1cm thick gnocchi into each. Using 2 forks, roll each gnocchi to give it its shape.
- 4. Bring a pan of salted water to boil. Add gnocchi in 2 or 3 batches, let cook for a few minutes, until they come up to the surface. They them out with a skimmer and set aside.
- 5. To prepare goat béchamel: pour flour in a pan and add a tiny bit of milk - it will help to avoid clumps. Stir with a whip until you get a homogeneous texture, then add the rest of milk as well as nutmeg and a pinch of salt.
- 6. On low heat, cook the béchamel for about 10 minutes, while stirring regularly. The béchamel sauce is ready when it's thicker, creamy and not too runny. Once done, turn off fire and add goat cheeses. Stir well to incorporate properly.
- 7. Preheat oven to 180C. In a salad bowl, stir gnocchi, béchamel sauce and spinach together. Mind to coat well all ingredients, then pour into an oven dish and add more grated goat tomme on the top. Put in oven for about 30 minutes at 180C, until cheese is melted and golden. Serve hot.
