Dunderi from scratch

I haven’t really been in the kitchen much since my vacation. I took a cooking class in Turkey, but that was only one day, and I’ve been sick and busy since I returned. 

Sickness lost me almost an entire CSA box. Too sick to put it away it mostly rotted while still packed tightly in brown paper bags and sitting in a patch of sunlight. Warm and closely bound, the beans molded the apricots spoiled.

I salvaged the basil, and made pesto (realizing for the first time that my food processor works better than the blender). The pizza that followed was ok, but nothing dazzling; something was off and I can only blame myself. So long removed from my kitchen I seem to have lost my touch: I added too much sugar to the crust, the pesto lacked bite, the zucchini lacked salt.

Sunday, sickness testing my body for a possible return, I didn’t manage to make ,anything more than taco soup (one can of black beans, one can of pinto beans, one can of corn, one can of diced or stewed tomatoes, one can of pumpkin, and taco seasoning- ground meat optional). 

I made tortillas (also slightly off) the night before and a kohlrabi and cabbage slaw. It should have been amazing, but mostly it was just ok.

Today was the day though. I found a recipe in Tasting Table before I left for Turkey. It tantalized me from the beginning…a pasta made almost entirely of cheese. This seemingly inverse of gnocchi…light and airy to gnocchi’s density. I’d never heard of this…dunderi…but oh how I wanted to.

Fleeing from the day’s stress, discarding my working demeanor, I took to measuring out ingredients.

I never used to measure everything out, like on the cooking shows, it always seemed so wasteful, extra things to wash. But my recent spate of cooking has taught me that order before cooking makes orderly cooking –mise en place makes sense. And so I pulled down ramekins, measured out flour, separated eggs, minced rosemary. 

Everything in the proper place, I began to mix according to the recipe. 

I’m not sure I’ve ever made a more ridiculously decadent dish that wasn’t a dessert. Two cups of ricotta cheese, one cup of parmesan, six egg yolks, and a little more than a cup of flour (a bit of kosher or sea salt). 

The recipe calls for nutmeg but I hate nutmeg as I hate few things and the idea of fresh fragrant rosemary called to me and so I minced it as fine as I could and sprinkled that in with the other ingredients. 

Rolling it out was a learning experience – one I’ll improve at next time, having learned what the dough does in a huge pot of boiling salted water. The little dumplings expand in the water, their edges, if not definitely rolled fluff out wildly like my hair. Holding their shape firmly or waving free in the boiling currents of the water, they float to the surface when they are ready to be fished out and drained. 

The final step is a half cup of butter melted and browned slowly on the stove top. Two teaspoons of lemon and a little zest and salt. Drop the hot dumplings in and coat. 

I fancied mine up a tad. I lightly pan-fried some eggplants, diced fresh heirloom tomatoes, sautéed some kohlrabi greens, and grated parmesan on top (as if the cup inside the pasta wasn’t enough).

Delicious.

The whole thing is light and airy, not particularly cheesy.