Sausage and Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Sage Brown Butter

Directions

1. Thaw frozen pork sausage roll overnight under refrigeration.

2. Prepare one batch of Sweet Potato Gnocchi to recipe attached. Dust gnocchi with flour to prevent sticking and keep chilled until service.

3. Fill a medium stockpot with cold salted water and heat over medium heat, until gently boiling.

4. In a large non-stick sauté pan over medium high heat, brown and crumble Jones Dairy Farm pork sausage into bite size pieces. Remove from pan, drain and set aside.

5. Wipe sauté pan clean, return to stove and reduce heat to medium. Add 1 Tbsp of reserve pork pan drippings. Once shimmering, add julienne shallot. Stir occasionally until translucent. Add minced garlic and continue to stir until fragrant. Remove from pan, set aside.

6. Add pieces of gnocchi to the pot of boiling salted water. Gently stir to ensure they don’t stick to the bottom of the pan. Cook approx. 2 minutes until they float. Once floating, use a slotted spoon to remove gnocchi and drain on a paper lined plate.

7. In the meantime, return pan to stove over medium heat, add cold butter and allow it to melt out. Continue swirling the pan over the heat, the brown butter solids will brown and the top will foam, giving off a nutty aroma. Add the fresh sage to the pan and swirl, allowing each piece of sage to fry and crisp up, releasing their oils into the butter, giving addition flavor.

8. Add gnocchi to the pan, allowing each piece to coat with the brown butter. Continue to stir and brown each piece. Approx. 3 minutes.

9. Once gnocchi are brown and crisp, add the sausage, shallot and garlic mixture and sweet peas to the pan and stir gently. Continue stirring and bring all ingredients in the pan up to temperature.

10. Remove from heat, spoon into bowls and top with grated Romano cheese. Garnish with fried sage leaves.

11. For the Sweet Potato Gnocchi:

    Preheat oven to 400*F. Wash potatoes, poke with fork and place on a parchment lined sheet tray. Bake in the oven until a fork can easily be inserted and the potatoes are tender to the touch. Remove potatoes from oven and allow to cool, until you are able to handle them.

12. Peel each sweet potato into a medium bowl, rough cut into smaller chunks. Using a fork mashed potatoes well until mixture is fairly smooth and free of lumps.

13. In a bowl, combine flour and salt. On a clean and dry work space, dump flour and salt. Make a well in the middle of the flour. Carefully drop sweet potato mixture into the well.

14. Coat hands with flour and start to work the mashed sweet potato into the flour with your hands. Keep adding flour to the dough so that it’s not too sticky. You will want a nice dry dough to work with. The process could take a larger amount of flour, depending on the size of your sweet potatoes.

15. Once a dough ball is formed, cut it into four equal parts. Using floured hands, roll the dough out into logs about ½ inch thick. Using a bench knife or chef knives, cut the logs into ¾-1 inch pieces of gnocchi. Make sure to roll the cut sides into flour, to prevent sticking. Continue this process with the other three pieces until all of the gnocchi is cut and dusted.

16. Keep the uncooked gnocchi on a parchment lined sheet tray, and chilled until service. Gnocchi can be used fresh, stored under refrigeration for 3 days or frozen for 3 weeks.