Threepeat

I guess you could say we are having fun with our big batch of gnudi!

Here's preparation Numero Tre in an ongoing series until we finish them.

By the way, it is not lost on me that having made these gnudi, I have at least four killer meals for two people on hand. I'm retired and don't really need time savers, but if you are working I can recommend making the gnudi on Sunday and enjoying them nearly all week just by whipping up an easy, new and different sauce each evening and boiling another pot of salted water. Che protebbe essere plù facile?

Last night's rendition was the best so far. I started with about a tablespoon of butter, a grinding of fresh pepper and a tad of garlic salt in a little pool of extra virgin olive oil in the bottom of a wide pan. When it was hot and the butter had foamed but not burned (thanks to the oil), I added four or five cloves of minced garlic and let that sizzle over a very low flame to flavor the butter and to soften the garlic. While the garlic was cooking, I boiled up another big pot of salted water for the gnudi.

Using a Meyer lemon, one of the few left from our SOCA care package, I squeezed both halves into the pan with the garlic and mixed it around with the butter/evoo before adding a handful of fresh peas right out of the pod. The water came to a boil and in went another eight gnudi (five for him, three for moi) where they spun and soared in the roiling water for about eight minutes. When the peas had just barely dimpled and were still brightly green, I scooped out the now-floating gnudi with a slotted spoon and dumped them unceremoniously into the lemon butter mixture with the peas. Toss, toss until all were coated evenly, then plated. In our house, Parmesano Reggiano comes to the table in a block with a grater and everyone grates her/his own. That's all there is to it!

The gnudi were just as good this third night as they were the previous two, light as angel food cake, the perfect substrate for whatever sauce you create. This one was our favorite so far - a little tart from the Meyer juice, a little peppery, a lot buttery but redeemed from unctuousness by the fresh peas and the lemon. I may not even invent sauce Numero Quattro - Numero Tre deserves a threepeat.