Baked Gnocchi with tomato, chilli, bacon & garlic
I’ve needed comfort food these last couple of weeks. Not only have I been having zero sleep, but planning a wedding takes up ALL of your time. Like, ALL of it. And not only that, but 110 dresses later and I still haven’t found “The One”. Does that “one” dress even exist?? If it does, it has avoided me as of yet.
I will find you dress, and you will be mine.
Anyway, so I needed some cheering up. I decided that the Wedding healthy eating phase would end dramatically and I would just eat something I liked. Like those little filling shapes of joy (aka gnocchi) and smother it in a creamy tomato sauce and lashings of mozzarella.
It was amaze.
NB – Since writing this post I have actually now FOUND the dress. So this must actually work!? Right??
Ingredients Needed:
Serves four.
- 500g of ready made gnocchi
- half of 1 large white onion
- 3 small chillies (I used the pickled kind)
- 5 slices of thin, streaky bacon
- 1200g of tinned, chopped tomatoes
- 1 tablespoon of olive oil
- 5 fresh large, basil leaves
- 250g hard mozzarella cheese
- 2 table spoons of extra thick cream
Method
- Preheat the oven to a high heat. Chop your onion, garlic and chilli and place them all in the pan. Add the oil and the bacon and fry on a medium heat until your onions start to brown and the bacon is done and starting to crisp.
- Next, add all of the tomatoes in one go. Add a pinch of salt and the basil leaves. Stir, stir, stir and cook for 20 minutes.
- Add two tablespoons of that amazing cream that you just want to stick your face into and stir again. Keep stirring until it all mixes together, then simmer for 10 minutes. Whilst you’re doing this boil the gnocchi. Place them in hot water and when they float up to the top fish them out and add them to the pan. Keeeep stirring.
- Once all the gnocchi is in the pan and thoroughly coated, fill up your oven proof-dish half way and add the cheese so that it covers the top. Then add the second half so that the dish is totally full and cover the top with cheese again. Place in the oven until the top of the cheese starts to brown.
- Once out of the oven leave to stand for 5 minutes. Then, enjoy.
