Chiara Pavan's “gnocchi al latte” pay homage to a recipe from the 1500s, but with a contemporary twist. Ready to get your hands dirty? Make them for MasterChef, where the Venissa chef is set to return on Friday, November 28, for a very special episode.

VENETIAN GNOCCHI

The talented chef at Venissa tells us about the origins of her Venetian gnocchi, which combine memories and research in a single dish: "I discovered them in the book ‘A tòla coi nostri veci’, a Venetian text that also collects ancient recipes. This one, in particular, dates back to 1500: in Verona, the ‘city of gnocchi’, gnocchi made from water and flour had already been prepared since 1200 and were considered a poor man's food. The Venetian version reported in the text, on the other hand, is richer and includes the use of milk."

Ingredients:

330 g milk
110 g flour
8 g salt
Swiss chard
Basil
Pine nuts
Herbs such as mugwort, rue, mint, sorrel

Procedure

Bring the milk to the boil and sprinkle in the flour with the salt, whisking well.

Once the dough is ready, form it into strands and cut them into gnocchi-sized pieces.

For the sauce

Cook the Swiss chard and blanch the basil, first boiling it and then immersing it in cold water with ice to preserve its color. Blend everything together and then stir the gnocchi into the sauce. To serve, add the toasted pine nuts. Chiara Pavan also uses a fermented pine nut sauce.

Finally, add the herbs from the garden and serve immediately.