As Gina mentioned, Ruth dresses up in various disguises to eat at the restaurants so she isn’t recognized. In each of her disguises, she finds out something about herself. I like that. I think that’s why I like changing my appearance so much (hair colors/cuts/styles, etc). Every time you change your looks drastically like that, you find something out you didn’t realize before. For example, if you think you’re a wallflower, and then dye your hair bright red… you might be surprised at how you really aren’t a wallflower. Or maybe it’s the hair that changes you? In Ruth’s case, it was wigs and makeup, in addition to a few smartly chosen wardrobe choices.

There are tons of wonderful food/meal recipes in this book, and I want to make many of them, but I haven’t had the opportunity to make them yet, I was planning on the risotto but Brianne did it. So I figured I’d go with a dessert. I had originally planned on making her New York cheesecake, but Jeanine beat me to it, and Gina took Nicky’s vanilla cake. *shakes fist* That’s what happens when you wait too long I guess. So what’s a baker to do?

I picked the Last-Minute chocolate cake. It sounded amazing, and I decided to make it for Valentine’s Day. I made some strawberry-vanilla cupcakes too, but I wanted to make something chocolate. This was the perfect recipe. I made it into cupcakes (of course) and frosted it with vanilla buttercream and topped it with chocolate hearts & Red Hot candies.

Last-Minute Chocolate Cake

• 4 ounces fine quality unsweetened chocolate
• ¾ stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter
• ¾ cup brewed strong black coffee
• 2 tablespoons Grand Marnier
• ¾ cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• ½ teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 300° F.

Butter and flour a 9-inch-by-5-inch loaf pan (I used a muffin tin, duhhh).

Combine the chocolate, butter and coffee in the top of a double boiler or in a very heavy pot. Stir constantly over low heat until melted. Let the mixture cool for 15 minutes. Then add the Grand Marnier, sugar, egg and vanilla. Stir well.

Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt together, and add this to the chocolate mixture. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan (fill muffin tins anywhere from ½-¾ full) and bake for 30- 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean (I ended up getting 18 cupcakes, and they baked at 350° F for about 25-30 minutes).

Serves 6.

I omitted the Grand Marnier, only because I didn’t have it. So I added an extra tablespoon of coffee and 1 teaspoon orange extract. It came out awesome, and surprisingly went very well with the Red Hots! I used Baker’s brand unsweetened 1 oz. chocolate squares for the chocolate in the recipe. This is a really great dark, rich, chocolate-y cake with a great “extra” flavor. Some people who tasted it couldn’t quite put their finger on what it was exactly… but they all agreed it is super yum. All in all it was a really good chocolate cake recipe. I’ll definitely make it again. Maybe next time I’ll make it as a cake, and top it with vanilla ice cream as Ruth suggests in the book. Mmm. But also this would make an awesome layer cake if you double it.

I know, chocolate cake around Valentine’s Day is a kind of cliched thing to do, and boring, but have some pity on me. I promise I’ll be back soon with another recipe, less boring too. I won’t let you down, Cooking the Books… I won’t let you down!

Psst.. the cupcakes in the background? They’re made of cloth, handmade and hand-painted, and were a gift from my mother. If you’d like to know where to buy similar creations, shoot me an e·mail or ask me on Twitter!

I was slightly disappointed come Christmas Eve. More in myself than anything. You see, I had spent all day attempting to cook with quite an eager, overtired toddler underfoot. While she was able to help with most of the desserts I was making (and the baklava was put together during naptime), I was not ready for her to cover her hands in pasta dough and run all over the house I had spent all week cleaning. Silly me did not read about the fact that I needed a potato ricer and/or food mill until the potatoes were boiling in the pot. Strike one. As we speak, Amazon is running a search for one/both of those so I can try again, as gnocchi is my dad’s absolute favorite food. I was really rushed making it as well, as it was getting late and I had hungry people waiting to be fed. Giulia’s sauce was really delicious, I thought, but my husband (sorry G!) still seems to prefer my own sauce (which is my grandmother’s recipe). My gnocchi was a little lumpy since I tried my best without a food mill. I was more disappointed in myself. I had been looking forward to making that recipe since finding it in the book, and everything else I made that day came out absolutely perfect, except the one I really wanted! So, live and learn. The consistency was right, but they were just a tad lumpy. I hope that next time (and I will definitely blog about it!) it comes out better.

As we say farewell to I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti, I feel very bittersweet. Partially because it was our first book, but I really felt myself understanding Giulia and where she came from, and I loved her story and her wonderfully positive take on everything. I feel like had we grown up closer to each other (Not like Nassau County and Brooklyn are terribly far away, but you get the point), I like to think we would have been friends. She had posted about this blog on her own twitter page (If you’re a fan of the book, or of her, follow her at @gmelucci) and on her own facebook page as well. There seems to be an unspoken camraderie of us Catholic School girls – kind of like the unspoken trials and tribulations of making it through years with those nuns. She is a fan of us, which makes this first book even more special – the fact that we were embraced so greatly by its author. I can only hope the future authors we read (and cook) enjoy our blog half as much as she has. So, thank you Giulia, for making our first couple of months with this blog SO worthwhile

I hope everyone had a happy and safe holiday and enjoyed your time with your families and loved ones. We sure did!

My attempt to make Giulia’s gnocchi was to take place on Christmas Day. I planned on making the gnocchi and the sauce, as well as roast a chicken (a very simple roast chicken, like the one a la Giulia I made a while back). And my attempt was very successful. Not perfect, but very close, and successful.

Gnocchi, if you’re uninitiated to the wonders of it, is pronounced “nioki”, the ‘g’ is silent. And people who pronounce it never fail to crack me up… “I’ll have the guh-notch-y…” Here’s some interesting background on it from Wikipedia:

The word gnocchi means “lumps”, and may derive from nocchio, a knot in the wood, or from nocca (knuckle). It has been a traditional Italian pasta type of probably Middle Eastern origin since Roman times. It was introduced by the Roman Legions during the enormous expansion of the empire into the countries of the European continent. In the past 2000 years each country developed its own specific type of small dumplings, with the ancient Gnocchi as their common ancestor. In Roman times, gnocchi were made from a semolina porridge-like dough mixed with eggs, and are still found in similar forms today, particularly in Sardinia (where they do not contain egg, however, and are known as malloreddus). One variety, gnocchi di pane (literally bread noodles), is made from bread crumbs and is popular in Friuli and Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol. Another variety from Trentino-Alto Adige/Sudtirol is spinach gnocchi, called strangolapreti. This translates to “choke the priest.” The use of potato is a relatively recent innovation, occurring after the introduction of the potato to Europe in the 16th century.

I love potato gnocchi, and ever since I had first read I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti I’ve been wanting to make this recipe. And it didn’t disappoint. The sauce was incredible. I was only feeding four, but Jay and I have appetites like Ethiopian refugees, so I actually used two 28 oz. cans of whole tomatoes, but not the plain, the ones seasoned with basil. I doubled the salt and sugar but not the wine or the butter. WOW. A super simple sauce, but really tasty. Perfect with the gnocchi. I think it’ll definitely become my go-to sauce recipe. I think the added basil was a great touch. Thank you Giulia (and Marcella Hazan)! And actually, speaking of feeding four, I had plenty of sauce for more, especially since the gnocchi recipe didn’t make as much as I anticipated, or maybe I made mine too large. Woops. But that’s cool, because tonight we’re having homemade margherita pizza with the remainder of the sauce. Yum.

Now for the gnocchi, I used three russet potatoes instead of two, and added a ¼-½ cup of extra flour. Brianne told me when she made hers, she had a problem because she didn’t have a ricer or food mill, and that worried me because I don’t either (and I looked in a bunch of stores and couldn’t find a ricer, so boo to them). I Googled it, and read that using a sieve works too. So I figured if I made the potatoes just a tad softer by boiling them a bit longer, they’d be easier to push through the sieve and therefore less lumpy in the pasta. Also, I peeled them before I boiled them, thinking that without skin they’d get softer. It totally worked. Even without a ricer, the potatoes were so soft and mushy I just pushed them down with a fork and they were the perfect texture. Voila! I cooked them about 55 minutes, which was only 15-20 minutes longer than recommended. The pasta wasn’t too soggy at all, either.

The shape… well, that was a bit harder. Mine came out all kinds of different sizes and shapes, but always with the signature fork-print. Maybe if I’d taken my time, and wasn’t rushed or on a schedule, I could’ve made them more even.  Mine were more like little squares and rectangles. Next time, I would roll them into little balls and then use my thumb and a fork to make the little impressions. But who cares, really. They tasted awesome.

As far as the name of the recipe (see below), you’ll have to read the book to find out why it’s referred to as such. *smiles*

No- Nookie Gnocchi

• 2 russet potatoes
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon salt
• pinch freshly grated nutmeg
• 1 heaping cup flour, plus more for dusting
• salt
• freshly grated pepper
• freshly grated parmigiano

Put the potatoes in a pot with enough water to cover, bring to a boil, and cook, partially covered, until they are just tender, about 35-40 minutes. Remove the potatoes to a cutting board and peel with a paring knife as soon as you can stand to touch them, then run them through a potato ricer or food mill, spreading them out on a cutting board to cool completely.

Mix the egg, salt and nutmeg. Form the cooled potatoes into a mound and pour the egg mixture into it. Begin kneading the potato and egg mixture with your hands, adding the flour a little at a time, being careful not to overwork the dough.

When the flour is evenly combined with the potato and the dough is only a little sticky, divide it into 4 pieces.Roll each piece into a long, narrow tube like a garden snake and slice it crosswise into little soft pillows, each ½ inch wide. Rest each pillow on the tip of your thumb and impress it with the tines of a fork lightly dusted with flour, creating a ribbed surface for the sauce to cling to. Keep a bowl of flour nearby to dip the fork into, as it will become tacky- or better yet, keep some extra forks nearby.

Add the gnocchi about 10 at a time to a pot of salted boiling water. When they rise to the top, they’re done. Remove them to a serving bowl with a slotted spoon or spider and continue to cook in batches. Toss with the sauce and serve with grated parmigiano and freshly grated pepper.

Yield: about 6 dozen.

For the sauce:

(Adapted from Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking)

• 1 (28-ounce) can whole tomatoes
• ½ cup (1 stick) butter
• 1 medium onion, peeled and cut in half
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• ¼ cup red wine
• 1 teaspoon salt

Put all ingredients in a large saucepan over medium heat, bring to a simmer, then lower heat and cook for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove onion before tossing sauce with the gnocchi.

And to anyone who complains about making sauce, or says they can’t make homemade pasta- BASTA. It is not that difficult at all. If I can do it, you can do it too.

So on that note I’ll be gone, but I just wanted to wish all our readers a Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad, Joyeux Noel and Buon Natale! And thanks to you as well for reading our adventures in bookery cookery!

We’ll all be back soon with our adventures in gnocch-ery.