This recipe is sponsored by Land O’Lakes
I know. You might need a minute. I get it.
Just breathe it in… breathe in that sage, garlic, butter, pumpkin-gnocchi-pillow combo.
It is honestly too good to be legal. Are we breaking the law here? Because it feels suspiciously like we might be breaking the law.
How To Make Our Pumpkin Gnocchi (1 MIN):
Here in Minnesota we’re in that season now where fall is fully upon us and we’re starting to get days that require our Fall Selves to show up. Full force. Wearing sweaters. Swapping iced coffees for hot ones. Raking leaves out of our yards (I have done this zero times).
When my Fall Self shows up to the party, it does not show up empty handed. It says: I see you, Sweaters. I see you, Hot Coffees. I see you, People Who Rake. And it says: I am going to feed you something yummy.
Hints:
- Pumpkin
- Butter
- Sage
- Garlic
- Parmesan
Naturally we will use the most adorable stick of butter you’ve ever seen for this recipe, because a) ADORABLE, and b) it is just the right size for a date-night-size recipe like this one. The convenience of the Land O Lakes® Butter in Half Stick is one of my favorite developments to butter in the last… well… in my lifetime. It’s hard to improve on a perfect thing, but in this case, BUTTER WAS JUST IMPROVED. So long, random three-tablespoon remnant sticks of butter that like to make themselves at home in our fridges. So long.
When I get my hands on that salty, creamy butter packed into tiny paper-wrapped vessels of love, the romantic fall recipes just start flowing.
And romantic indeed. Kids, cover your eyes now.
The thing about the sauce for this gnocchi is that I didn’t want it to be a sauce in the way that a sauce normally is. I would almost call it a SHEEN sauce. I just wanted a SHEEN of something on those gnocchi – a little kiss of a coating – and the melted butter alone wasn’t doing it for me (says no one ever, but I’m a fall food diva).
So after melting and INFUSING THE BUTTER WITH SAGE AND GARLIC and fending off everyone in Minneapolis who came running to my kitchen to find out what smelled like literal food heaven, I added just a pinch of flour and a splash of cream and then thinned that baby out with some of the leftover gnocchi-boil water. You know, the stuff that turns cloudy because it’s got all the remnant starch in it from the gnocchi? It looks scary, but do not drain! Save that for your sauce. Your sheen sauce.
Are you picking up what I’m putting down here?
There really is nothing quite like fall.
God bless you, and God bless pumpkin gnocchi.
PS. Worth mentioning: this gnocchi is also very delicious hot off the pan, sans sauce, topped with a quick sprinkle of parm, for a little afternoon snack, as I found out during about 1500 rounds of recipe testing.
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Pumpkin Gnocchi with Sage Butter Sauce
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Total Time: 35 minutes -
Yield: 4 regular servings or 2 extra-generous servings
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Pin RecipeDescription
Pumpkin Gnocchi! So incredibly pillowy and delicious. Topped with a 5 ingredient sage garlic butter sauce that will blow your mind.
Ingredients
Pumpkin Gnocchi:
- 1 medium-large russet baking potato
- 1 cup pumpkin puree
- 1 egg
- 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour (more as needed)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons Land O Lakes® Salted Butter in Half Sticks (for pan frying)
Sage Butter Sauce:
- 2 tablespoons Land O Lakes® Salted Butter in Half Sticks
- a few sage leaves and a smashed clove of garlic
- 1 tablespoon flour
- 1 tablespoon heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup starchy water (leftover from boiling the gnocchi)
Instructions
- Potato Prep: Bake the potato – see notes – and pull off the skin. Let the potato rest for a while to cool down. Once it’s cool enough to handle, grate it until you have about 1 1/2 cups of very fine potato shreds.
- Gnocchi Dough: Mix potato shreds with pumpkin puree. Measure flour onto a clean surface and put the potato/pumpkin mixture in the center. Make a well and crack your egg into it. Sprinkle salt on top. Grab a fork and whisk up the egg real quick. Using your hands, mix all ingredients into a dough. Don’t overmix. When it starts to come together, form the dough into a mostly-smooth, rounded little loaf.
- Gnocchi Prep: Cut off slices of the mound and roll each one into a long rope. Cut the rope into bite sized pieces. Place the gnocchi pieces on a plate (make sure they’ve got a little flour coating so they don’t stick).
- Cooking the Gnocchi: Bring a large pot of water to boil. Add the gnocchi, carefully, one at a time, to the water. You may need to work in batches. When the gnocchi rise to the top of the pot of boiling water, immediately remove them with a slotted spoon. Set aside. Melt your butter in a large nonstick skillet. Pan fry the gnocchi, undisturbed, to get one side lightly crispy and leave the other side soft. Remove from pan and set aside to wait for saaaauce.
- Butter Sauce: In the same pan, add butter, sage leaves, and garlic clove. Let the garlic and sage cook for a few minutes over low heat. When the sage leaves are starting to get crispy, remove from heat. Remove garlic as well. When it’s melted, add the flour and whisk. Add the heavy cream and whisk. Add the starchy water slowly, whisking to make a sauce that is the consistency you want. Toss with gnocchi, top with sage leaves and Parmesan, and BE HAPPY AND PROUD BECAUSE LOOK WHAT YOU MADE! Now pour yourself a glass of wine and feast.
Notes
I baked my potato in the microwave. Yes, that’s right folks, I’m classy. Poke holes in your potato, wrap with a paper towel, and micro for 5-6 minutes. Voila. Less flour is better, so if your potato is small and you only get 1 cup of potato shreds out of it, then don’t add quite as much flour. I found the magic amount to be something between 1 1/2 cups and 2 cups, but it is a little different every time depending on the water content of your potato, your pumpkin, etc. You want to be able to handle the dough, but you do not want it to be overly stiff. A delicately soft dough, while it requires a little more TLC, is a good (delicious) thing. We are looking for soft pillows here. Your gnocchi might not be pretty. That’s okay. They get prettier once they are pan fried and covered in sauce and topped with parmesan and fried sage. Trust.
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Prep Time: 20 minutes
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Cook Time: 15 minutes
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Category: Dinner
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Cuisine: Italian-Inspired
Keywords: pumpkin gnocchi, sage butter sauce, gnocchi recipe
Thank you to Land O’Lakes for sponsoring this post!
One More Thing!
This recipe is part of our easy pumpkin recipes page. Check it out!
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