I Guess I Am a Two Post a Day Kind of Girl...

So, I always vowed that when I did start a blog that I wouldn't be obsessive and blog twice a day or sixteen times a day but the gnocchi I made for dinner has forced me to go back on my word.

Now, let's remember that I've not been taught how to write a recipe in school yet and furthermore, if any of you have watched me actually cook, I rarely measure but I am going to try and do my best to provide you with the basic instructions to make this delicious dinner.

6 slices of bacon, cut into 1/2 inch strips
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 14oz can of diced fire roasted tomatoes
1/4 cup half and half
1 14 oz can of artichokes, sliced into fourths
1 package of store-bought gnocchi
Juice of half a lemon
2 tablespoons chopped fresh flat-leaf Italian parsley
Freshly grated Pecorino Romano cheese to taste
Salt and pepper to taste

So to start, I chopped the bacon and let it get all nice and crispy in the pan and then I took it out and threw the onion in the bacon grease to get all nice and cooked up. As the bacon was cooking, I put on a pot of water to boil for the gnocchi and then after about 5 to 7 minutes on a medium high flame, the onion was almost finished cooking, so I tossed in the garlic and let it cook for about 30 more seconds, just until I could smell the garlic. Then I tossed in the can of tomatoes and let everything get all happy and hot together before I pulled the sauce off the burner. Using an immersion blender (though a regular blender would be fine) I just pulsed the sauce until it was starting to smooth out -- I wanted to leave a little bit of the texture of the diced tomatoes in there, although, blending isn't a must, you could easily skip the step without fear. Since I noticed that my gnocchi water was boiling, I added the little dumplings to the salted water and then added my tomato sauce backed to the pan along with the cream, artichokes, salt and pepper and lemon juice. By the time the gnocchi were done, the sauce was warm and all amalgamated together and I threw the gnocchi into my saute pan and mixed everything together because there was infinitely more room in the pan to mix than in the bowls. After plating, I topped the pasta with a little bit of Pecorino, a bit of bacon and a little touch of parsley. It was seriously delicious. Honestly. I took a picture for y'all but it won't taste as good if you try to eat your screen as it did here in NYC.



Sorry for the lack of parsley in the picture...I promise it tastes better with the parsley!