Malfatti Recipe 465

MALFATTI RECIPE - (4.6/5)

Steps:

• Drain cooked spinach and squeeze out extra liquid until very dry. Combine with all ingredients, except flour. Refrigerate 1 hour. Bring pot half full of salted water to a simmer. Drop spinach cheese mixture by tablespoons into flour and roll each lightly into long logs. Cut into 1.5 inch dumplings. Drop dumplings into the gently simmering water. When they rise to the top, remove with a slotted spoon (approximately 3 to 5 minutes). In a saucepan, heat butter and sage leaves until both are browned and sage leaves are crisp. Spoon butter over malfatti and top with the crisp sage leaves. If preferred, top with more Parmesan cheese.

MALFATTI (ITALIAN SPINACH RICOTTA DUMPLINGS IN NAPOLI SAUCE)

Steps:

• Saute garlic and onion: Heat oil in a small pot or large skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and onion and cook for 3 minutes until onion is softened.
• Simmer sauce: Add remaining ingredients plus the stem of basil. Bring to a simmer, then reduce stove to low and cook, stirring every now and then, for 20 minutes. It should be fairly thick rather than a loose runny sauce.
• Drain ricotta, if needed: The ricotta should be the dry and fairly crumbly type rather than wet, soft and almost spreadable. If it's wet, see Note 1 for removing excess water (wet ricotta makes Malfatti hard to shape and cook!)
• Sweat spinach: Toss spinach with 1/2 tsp salt in large colander. Leave for 20 minutes. Roll up in tea towel and squeeze tightly to remove excess liquid. Roughly chop.
• Sauté garlic, eschalot and spinach: Heat oil in a skillet over medium high heat. Add garlic and eschalot, cook for 1 minute until translucent. Add spinach and cook until just wilted. Transfer to large bowl, allow to cool.
• Malfatti mixture: Add ricotta and all remaining Malfatti ingredients into the bowl. Mix well to combine. It should be too wet to roll with hands without sticking, but still firm enough to shape into dumplings.
• Form dumplings: Using 2 dessert spoons, scoop up about 1 1/2 tablespoons of mixture then shape into a football (quenelle) using the two spoons. Place on a paper-lined tray. You should get about 24-30.
• Boil dumplings: Bring a large pot of water to the boil, then carefully put 6 dumplings in. Cook for 2 minutes, they should float to the surface. Remove with slotted spoon on to paper towel lined tray. Repeat for remaining Malfatti.
• Preheat oven to 180°C / 350°F.
• Assemble: Pour Napoli Sauce into a baking dish, then top with Malfatti. Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil.
• Bake 15 minutes or until the Malfatti has a faint blush of gold on the surface (Note 3).
• Serve! Sprinkle baked Malfatti with parmesan and basil leaves (tear large leaves). Spoon into bowls and served as-is. No starchy side is required, think of these as like gnocchi. Just add a leafy green salad with Italian Dressing or Balsamic Dressing!

MALFATTI OR GNOCCHI GNUDI (PASTA WITHOUT THE PASTA)

Steps:

• Wash the cleaned spinach and shake off the moisture until only a small amount of water clings to the leaves. Steam lightly until just wilted. Drain the spinach well.
• Put the spinach into a lint-free dish towel and squeeze out the water. Twist the dish towel and squeeze more water out. Keep squeezing the spinach until you truly believe that you've gotten all the water out. Now, continue to squeeze out the remaining water. Spread out the spinach onto a cookie sheet that has been lined with paper towels to soak up any remaining moisture. If it looks sort of dry and a bit stringy, you're ready to move on.
• Mix the ricotta cheese, egg yolks, nutmeg, parmesan cheese, salt and pepper. Set aside.
• Chop the spinach into small pieces. Do not use a food processor for this process, you are looking for pieces not puree. Add the spinach to the ricotta mixture.
• Pull out a small ball of "dough" and make a walnut-shaped dumpling. The dough will be very very soft, but it should hold together. If you truly believe that you MUST add some breadcrumbs, do so a little bit at a time. Added breadcrumbs will take away from the angel's pillow tenderness that true malfatti boast. Continue on with shaping the little balls.
• Lightly dust each dumpling with the flour and set aside on a cookie sheet, being careful to use the smallest amount of flour for each dumpling.
• Boil 10 cups of salted water in a large pot. When the water is boiling, turn down the heat so you get a nice simmer.
• Drop the malfatti into the water one at a time, making sure that you don't crowd them in the pot. As the dumplings rise to the surface, carefully pull them out using a strainer spoon and place in a large bowl.
• After all the malfatti are in the bowl, sprinkle on the butter and plate. Serve with a light tomato cream sauce and a good dusting of the best parmesan cheese you can find.

MRS. SEBASTIANI'S MALFATTI

Steps:

• Cook the fresh spinach in the water clinging to the leaves after washing, or cook the frozen according to package instructions. Drain over a bowl, squeezing out as much water as possible - do this in small handfuls so you can press out the most water - and chop. Reserve the water.
• Briefly soak the bread in the reserved spinach water plus enough hot water to cover and squeeze dry.
• Sauté the onion and garlic in the olive oil until tender, 3 to 5 minutes. Mix the spinach, bread, sautéed onion and garlic and put through the finest blade of a meat grinder or pulse in a food processor until chopped, then scrape into a mixing bowl.
• Add 1/2 cup of the dry bread crumbs, the cup of Parmesan, parsley, salt, pepper and basil. Stir in the eggs. With lightly floured hands, gently shape the mixture into sausagelike links, 1 inch round by 3 inches long. If they do not hold together, add more bread crumbs. Lay on a baking sheet.
• Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Drop the links, one at a time, into the boiling water. Reduce the heat to let the water barely simmer and cook until the malfatti float to the surface, 1 to 2 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon, drain on paper towels and place in a greased baking dish, large enough to fit the malfatti in a single layer.
• Spoon the tomato sauce over the links, sprinkle with lots of cheese and broil to reheat.

BADLY MADE DUMPLINGS (MALFATTI)

Steps:

• Note: I chopped the spinach finely in a food processor (only too about 5 seconds) then boiled it very briefly-about 15 seconds in boiling, salted water. Refreshed the spinach under cold running water in a fine mesh strainer and used a wooded spoon to squeeze out the excess water. The original recipes reads: Boil the spinach in well-salted water until tender, refresh under cool running water, and squeeze as dry as you can. Chop spinach finely (either in a food processor for evenly green dumplings or with a knife for a speckled appearance.).
• Mix the spinach with the ricotta and other ingredients except salt, pepper and tomato sauce to make a very soft dough.
• Season lightly with salt and pepper, but not with a heavy hand - the flavors are very subtle.
• Roll [1] golf ball-sized lump as round as you can in plenty of flour. The dough is so soft you will never manage a sphere, but that is why they are called malfatti. I used an oiled cookie scoop to shape the dough. I soon realized the less I touch the dough, the better. May take a few times preparing this recipe to get the hang of it.
• Bring a pot of salted water to a boil (the spinach water is fine if you still have it) and drop in the ball to make sure it is strong enough not to break up. If the ball doesn't break apart, roll the rest of your dough to make about a dozen dumplings. If it isn't, mix a bit more flour in, and then roll the balls.
• Cook at a gentle simmer for 10-15 minutes, counting from when they rise to the surface. You can take them out sooner if you like an oozing middle. I cooked the malfatti a solid fifteen minutes.
• Use a slotted spoon to transfer the dumplings to a serving platter.
• Two topping options and I tested both: Topping #1. Serve malfatti on a bed of warm tomato sauce and top with grated Parmesan or pecorino cheese.
• Topping #2: Or fry butter with 12 sage leaves until the leaves are crispy and the butter nutty; pour directly on top of the malfatti. Serve with amount of grated Parmesan. However, I skipped the Parmesan cheese for topping #2.

MALFATTI WITH PANCETTA AND CHERRY TOMATOES

Steps:

• Dust a parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet generously with flour; set aside. Place ricotta in the center of cheesecloth. Gather up the sides in your hands and wring out excess liquid. Transfer ricotta to a few sheets of paper towels and pat dry with more paper towels.
• Pulse ricotta, egg, 6 oz. Parmesan, and 1 1/2 tsp. salt in a food processor to combine. Transfer to a large bowl; sift in 1 cup flour and mix until just barely combined (try not to overmix). Scrape ricotta mixture onto a floured surface and divide into 4 pieces. Roll each piece into a 22x3/4" rope. Cut into 3/4" pieces and place dumplings on prepared baking sheet.
• Combine pancetta and 3 Tbsp. oil in a cold large skillet and set over medium heat. Cook, stirring often, until pancetta is brown and crisp, 6-8 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer to a bowl; reserve skillet.
• Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a simmer (do not let it boil). Working in batches if needed, cook dumplings until they expand in size and float to the surface, about 3 minutes.
• Ladle about 3/4 cup pasta cooking liquid into reserved skillet and add dumplings, tomatoes, and butter. Increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring gently (don't toss), until sauce thickens slightly and coats dumplings, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat and season with salt and pepper.
• Divide malfatti among bowls. Finely grate lemon zest over, drizzle with oil, and top with pancetta and Parmesan.