A SkyGarden Culinary Adventure - Gnocchi and Pesto with Chef Hubertus Surm

About our Chef : Hubertus Surm was the founding chef for Isadora's restaurant in the early 80's on Granville Island. Isadora's was Vancouver's first cooperative restaurant and ran successfully for 20 years.  Hubertus moved to Saturna Island 14 years ago and established a small cafe serving local, innovative cuisine.  He also produces his GoNuts burger (a vegetarian walnut burger) on Saturna and distributes it to the mainland (can be found at Whole Foods, Capers, etc.)

Gnocchi
Potatoes - boiled with skins on and then pealed
note: choose potatoes with a lower starch content eg. Yukon Gold
Approximately 1 cup of flour

Let the potatoes cool, then peel.  Press the peeled potatoes through a potato ricer into a bowl.  Combine flour with potatoes until you have a moist, dough like consistency (note: should still be a little sticky)

Roll the dough into a ball.  Cut the ball into 4s to make a more manageable piece.
Take one of the 4 pieces and roll into a “sausage”.  Cut the “sausage” into 1 ½” pieces.  Roll each 1 ½” piece with a fork to give it a nice texture.  Repeat for the remaining 3 pieces of dough.

Cooking

Drop into boiling water until the pieces float then remove with a slotted spoon.

Pesto
½ c olive oil
A few cloves of garlic (2)
3 Tbsp pine nuts
2 c washed basil
½ cup parmesan
3 Tbsp butter

Combine all ingredients in a food processor.  Serve.

To Freeze: Combine olive oil, garlic, pine nuts and basil and freeze. To serve thaw and combine with parmesan and butter

Note: You can also substitute the basil with other ingredients such as Kale and pecans, roast peppers, cilantro, garlic scapes etc.

Gorgonzola Sauce
1 c whipping cream
Gorgonzola
3 Tbsp butter

Combine in a saucepan to make a delicious sauce