A Kitchen Disaster

Also known as "I fucked it up" winter squash gnocchi

I had an entire plan. A few days before we were expected to have Ben’s parents over for dinner to celebrate his father’s birthday, we received a bunch of winter squash in our farm box. So I had the brilliant idea to make squash gnocchi with brown butter and sage. How hard could it be? I’d made homemade gnocchi so many times before. I’d studied up on recipes that included multiple ways to incorporate the squash. I had the entire day to get it done. It would go off without a hitch, right?

Well, here is the story of how I supremely fucked up my winter squash gnocchi with brown butter and sage, sending me into a rage that had me collapsed on my kitchen floor, crying like a small child.

I cut open the squash, scooped out the seeds, and then roasted it so that I could use the flesh. I then reduced the flesh in a saucepan to remove most of the water content. Most of the recipes that I consulted to put this recipe together called for a cup of this reduced squash mixture. But I had two cups, and I’m not one to waste food, so I used two and figured I’d just double the recipe.

This is literally never a good idea with gnocchi. The ratios are so precise that trying to fuck with them basically always results in a gummy, sticky, gross mixture. But I did, and I let the squash mixture cool, and started adding flour in. Very quickly, the dough turned into the exact gummy, sticky, gross mess that I was trying to avoid. And as I read the recipe to see what could be done, I saw that the dough was actually meant to rest for at least four hours. On any other day it would be fine, but that would bring me close to when Ben’s parents were set to arrive, which meant if the dough wasn’t salvageable, we’d be left without a meal.

And this, my friends, was the beginning of my meltdown. I threw the dough into the fridge, poured myself some wine, and started considering ways around the disaster. I sent Ben out for two boxes of ravioli on the off chance it didn’t work. He came back with three boxes (yay) of three different types of ravioli (fuck) which meant I didn’t have enough of one kind of ravioli to serve with the sage butter sauce (fuuuck.) and I didn’t have the time to explain to him why serving two different types of ravioli together with a sauce was NOT THE CULINARY EXPERIENCE I WAS GOING FOR (FUCKINGMOTHERFUCKFUUUUUCCK).

So even though it had only been an hour, I pull the dough, out, try to roll it out, and realize it is still, in face, a sticky, unsalvageable mess. I bellow “I FUCKING RUINED IT!!!” and throw the whole thing in the trash, collapsing to the ground in a heap of tears before bolting out the door back to the market where I buy chicken for cutlets (?!?!?) and ricotta. By this point, Ben has given up on trying to calm me down, and is pleading with me “I don’t understand! It’s only diner!! Why is this happening?!?!” The dog is flabbergasted. My kitchen is in chaos. And his parents are due in about an hour.

Finally, mercifully, I remember that I’d bought the ricotta at the market and set to work making a version of ricotta gnocchi that turn out just fine. (Hence no recipe here.) The next day, with great mortification, I download a self-help book on going with the flow and commit myself to a regular yoga and meditation practice.

So what is the point of all of this? I do not, I repeat, do not have my shit together in the kitchen, regardless of how I may characterize myself here. I am prone to these meltdowns. Cooking is really hard sometimes, okay! And even though I love it, I also sometimes really fucking hate it. I’m trying to unpack this perfectionism I feel around cooking and entertaining, and I do sometimes feel like this newsletter exacerbates it. But ya gotta eat, right? So I’ll continue heading to my kitchen, day after day, while trying to figure out how to not lose my shit over some roasted winter squash.

In the meantime, stay tuned for the next issue, where I will hopefully have an actual recipe for winter squash gnocchi with brown butter and sage.