Recipe no. 187 from Jean-Baptiste Reboul's La Cuisinière provençale (1909), page 94.
Ingredients
- milk
- butter
- salt
- pepper
- nutmeg
- semolina
- eggs
- sauce
- grated cheese
- melted butter
Preparation
- Preparing the pastePut half a litre of milk into a saucepan with 150 grams of butter, salt, pepper and nutmeg; bring to a boil and let 200 grams of semolina fall in like rain, stirring with a wooden spoon; let it boil a few minutes without stopping stirring with the spoon, this should form a paste that no longer sticks to the saucepan; then work in 5 or 6 eggs one after another, as described for gnocchi Roman-style.
- ShapingHave a saucepan of boiling water ready, take 2 dessert spoons, one in each hand; with the one in the left hand, take up some of the prepared paste, pressing it against the sides of the saucepan so that the top is smooth. With the one in the right hand, which you will have dipped in the water, lift the forcemeat off as cleanly as possible and drop it into the boiling water; it will detach itself; the pieces should be roughly egg-shaped.
- CookingWhen the paste is used up, bring to a boil and take off to the side, cover the saucepan and leave it thus for 7 to 8 minutes; then pass the gnocchi through cold water and drain them.
- Finishing and servingThis method of poaching gnocchi can equally be applied to all sorts of quenelles. Prepare a sauce as indicated in the previous article, put a few spoonfuls of it at the bottom of a gratin dish, arrange the gnocchi in it, side by side, coat with the sauce, sprinkle with grated cheese, drizzle with melted butter and gratinate as with the previous ones. These methods of preparing gnocchi are somewhat elaborate, but they give very good results.
Reboul's text
Put half a litre of milk into a saucepan with 150 grams of butter, salt, pepper and nutmeg; bring to a boil and let 200 grams of semolina fall in like rain, stirring with a wooden spoon; let it boil a few minutes without stopping stirring with the spoon, this should form a paste that no longer sticks to the saucepan; then work in 5 or 6 eggs one after another, as described for gnocchi Roman-style.
Have a saucepan of boiling water ready, take 2 dessert spoons, one in each hand; with the one in the left hand, take up some of the prepared paste, pressing it against the sides of the saucepan so that the top is smooth.
With the one in the right hand, which you will have dipped in the water, lift the forcemeat off as cleanly as possible and drop it into the boiling water; it will detach itself; the pieces should be roughly egg-shaped.
When the paste is used up, bring to a boil and take off to the side, cover the saucepan and leave it thus for 7 to 8 minutes; then pass the gnocchi through cold water and drain them.
This method of poaching gnocchi can equally be applied to all sorts of quenelles.
Prepare a sauce as indicated in the previous article, put a few spoonfuls of it at the bottom of a gratin dish, arrange the gnocchi in it, side by side, coat with the sauce, sprinkle with grated cheese, drizzle with melted butter and gratinate as with the previous ones.
These methods of preparing gnocchi are somewhat elaborate, but they give very good results.
Small Provençal glossary for this recipe
Reboul writes in French: no Provençal word appears in this recipe, apart from the dish's name itself. The table below gives the Provençal equivalents of the words used, in mistralian spelling, translated by Lingua Nostra. Each form is attested in our Provençal-English dictionary; click to open the entry.
| Provençal | English |
|---|---|
| plueio | rain |
| soumoulo | semolina |
| encourpoura | work in |
| rabina | gratinate |
Source: Jean-Baptiste Reboul, La Cuisinière provençale, Marseille, 1909, recipe no. 187, page 94. Public domain. Transcription, formatting and Provençal glossary by Lingua Nostra.