Gnocching on heaven's door

A pumpkin transformed

This piece first appeared in the Irish edition of The Sunday Times, October 2024

The annual re-lighting of the Aga has been deferred. When the children were at boarding school we used to fire it up for their first weekend home in the Autumn term but, of course, they are all fully grown-up now and there’s just the two of us and the dog to consider. It simply hasn’t been cold enough yet, although we do light the stove of an evening.

Speaking of which, we calculated our log reserves and discovered that we don’t have enough seasoned wood to get us through the colder months. So, we have gone for the next best thing to our own timber and ordered a huge bag of beautifully aged and neatly cut local ash logs from O’Keeffe’s, the sawmills, in Lismore. Great as they are, this will teach me to plan ahead; after all we are self-sufficient in wood if I can get organised.

Stacking those logs in one of the outbuildings was quite a warming exercise, as was the clearing of a bed for next year’s garlic crop. Garlic for planting seems to be in short supply this year: one of my usual ports of call had just elephant garlic, which is actually a kind of leek, and another had just one variety in stock, which I snapped up.

Part of the clearing operation has involved carefully removing the long roots of thistle. These are very brittle and if you leave even the tiniest fragment, even a spade’s depth underground, it will produce a fine new plant in no time. By contrast, nettles are a doddle, with roots like steel hawsers and a tendency to hang around near the surface. Hogweed, however, is the worst; once established it’s impossible to dig out without a JCB. Spot treatment with weedkiller is the only infallible way to get rid of it.

Inside in the tunnel, next year’s first peas are up and growing and have not been molested by rodents who can’t resist those sweet young shoots. It’s a cheering sight and they will soon be joined by another over-Wintering inside crop, the broad beans.

During the week we had what will probably be our last insalata triolore or, if you prefer, caprese, as the tomatoes are on their last legs. It was just a question of squashing a clove of garlic and rubbing it vigorously over a serving plate, then slicing on the tomatoes, tearing up some buffalo mozzarella (from Aldi) and sprinkling on the few surviving leaves of basil. Then a good drizzle of very good olive oil and a generous sprinkling of sea salt. This is the kind of thing we miss during the darker months, and no bought tomatoes, “heirloom” or not, can complete with your own tomatoes.

We have been saving tomato seed and hopefully will not need to buy any for sowing just after Christmas on the kitchen window ledges. It’s easily done: scoop out the seeds and cover with water. Leave for a few days and mould will form on the surface while the seeds, without their surrounding gel, will have dropped to the bottom of the container. Just rinse them and dry them. Needless to say, this won’t work for any F1 varieties like Shirley or Sungold as they don’t come true from seed.

In the kitchen, I managed to make gnocchi for the first time. This was not my first attempt but it was the first time the result looked, felt and tasted anything like the genuine article. Having used potatoes in the past, I looked to our squash crop – the lovely orange Uchiki Kuri which has reassuringly dry flesh.

Moisture is the enemy of the gnocchi maker – gnocchist? – and the usual Hallow’een pumpkin is definitely far too wet (and bland). I cut my squash in two, left in the seeds, and baked at 180ºC until the flesh was soft. Then I scooped out the seeds and put the flesh into a bowl, thoroughly mashed. I had 400g of squash and added 100g of flour, 40g of grated Parmesan, two teaspoons or so of fresh thyme leaves, two finely chopped cloves of garlic softened in a generous scoop of butter, a goodly grating of nutmeg, salt and pepper, and finally, the yolk of an egg. This combined to make a firm dough that was then manipulated into a roll, about the thickness of a stick of rock.

This was then sliced into suitable lengths, each squashed a little with a fork, and dropped into boiling, salted water. When they emerged from the depths and floated on top, I scooped them up with a slotted spoon and let them drain in a sieve before colouring them on the pan in plenty of butter.

The first batch was eaten with just some crisped pancetta and plenty of Parmesan, the second with a lamb-shank slow-cooked with tomatoes, white wine and anchovy. And the leftovers made a fine, if unusual, breakfast. You can read more about this on my Substack: tomdoorley.substack.com

A visit to one of the country’s finest wine outlets, Whelehan’s at the old Silver Tassie in Loughlinstown, yielded not just some great bottles (of which more anon) but also some Raclette from Savoie which was duly melted under a hot grill and scooped up with sourdough from Vinilo in Lismore, cornichons and some coppa. This went brilliantly with a white wine from the same region, Ami-Amis Les 13 Lunes, a blend of Grüner Veltliner, Altesse and Jacquère, definitely off-piste and tasting deliciously of russet apples and apricots. It’s €33 and well worth it as a worthy change from the usual suspects.

Wine:

There are some interesting reds in Lidl’s Autumn/Winter offering and I was particularly taken with the Deluxe Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2022 (€8.99) with its blackcurrant fruit, touch of eucalyptus and cedar wood. Paóni Merlot 2023 (€9.99) from the Veneto is fresh but also silky and elegant at the price. Tulga Toro Joven 2023 (€8.49) has none of the jammy, over-ripe fruit that I tend to associate with this Spanish region and instead is fresh and balanced. Château Pey de Pont Haut-Médoc 2019 (€14.99) is a cru bourgeois and is worth putting away for two or three years but is very decent now.