Gnocchi with Brown Butter, Butternut Squash, and Sausage [Turbo Recipe]

Okay, so, I post a lot of food photos on my personal Instagram. Like, probably two of every three photos are food. Because I cook and eat a lot. Surprise, surprise. Some of these even get posted to the Facebook page. You should follow that [/shameless plug].

Anyway, every now and then, I get a message from a friend or fan that asks about a food thing I posted. A lot of the stuff I post tends to be R&D for the site, or things I don't go through the whole rigmarole to get on here. So when someone asks about a recipe, I know it's probably one I should share.

An old friend of mine sent me a message the other night:

So, here we are. I try to be a man of my word, so I'm going to type this bad boy up in a new format: The Turbo Recipe. I'm going to forego the normal schtick, the normal gifs, photos, and whatever, and just crank out a quick instruction on a quick recipe. There's not even a quote at the top. Whoa. If we (you) like it, we (I) can do more of these. Here goes.

So, we're going to make the thing pictured here. It was delicious. And easy. Stupid easy. You're going to need the following:

• 1 package pre-made gnocchi
• 1 bag pre-cubed butternut squash
• 2 or 3 andouille sausage
• 1 stick of butter
• Shallots or onions
• Pepper, sage
• Parmesan cheese

You'll notice that most of these are all pre-made or pre-cut. That's because this looks fancier than it is an can be cooked on a weekday night. Win-win.

Get some water boiling for the gnocchi. These puppies will only have to cook for a few minutes, so don't get these in until later.

Brown the butter. Get a non-black pan, and cook the butter on medium heat, swirling the pan, until it's a nut-brown color, and it smells AMAZING. You'll know what I mean. Pour this and all the solids off, and reserve.

Slice the shallots/onion and sausage. Get your pan hot again, and get those on there with some olive oil, pepper, and sage. As they cook, the sausage will release fat. Good. Get the butternut squash in there, and start sauteeing it in all that flavor. Add the reserved butter.

Lower the heat, and keep sauteeing. Once the butternut squash is getting softer, drop the gnocchi into the water. They'll sink. When they float, they're done. Magic. Drain the gnocchi and save about a quarter cup or so of pasta liquid. Add that to the pan, and deglaze, making the sauce. Toss in the gnocchi, and top with cheese.

Try not to eat it all. But you will.

TL;DR:

• Boil water.
• Brown the butter, reserve.
• Sautee sausage, onion/shallot, and butternut squash with sage/pepper.
• Add butter and keep sauteeing until squash is softer.
• Cook gnocchi, drain. But save some water.
• Add water to pan mixture; stir.
• Add gnocchi. Mix and coat. Cheese.
• Love.

Enjoy!

-AC

Creamy Chipotle Chicken

"Chipotles to me are a one-of-a-kind pepper because they're smoked jalapenos, so they're fiery and they're smoky. It's good to use chipotles in salsas or soups or condiments - that works really well. To me, they always really pick up anything you put them in."

-Bobby Flay

I have never been a huge fan of spicy foods. I'm no glutton for self-prescribed pain. Most of the time, flavor is what suffers; you get a big bowl of fiery chili, and yes, it'll burn your mouth and throat so bad you'll need a fire hose, but you lose all flavor! It becomes nothing but a bowl of burn. And when you're already trying to watch your calories, you'd at least like to taste what little food you're carefully shoveling in, right?

That's where this recipe comes in. It's got a richness in a thick sauce, flavored by garlic, cumin, and most of all, smoky chipotles. We're not even going to use a can of condensed soup to get the creamy texture; it'll come from Mexican crema. Though it looks like something you might want to clean up off the carpet, it's pretty delicious. Let's make some creamy chipotle chicken.

Next Up: Creamy Chipotle Chicken

Need something a little spicy, a little rich, and is super easy to hack together? It might not look perfect, but it tastes so darned good. Coming soon: Creamy Chipotle Chicken!

Gravlax, A Fast-cured Salmon

"I'll love you, dear, I'll love you till China and Africa meet and the river jumps over the mountain and the salmon sing in the street."

-W.H. Auden

There are just times when Scandinavian culture is the oddest thing to me. I'm not talking about things like IKEA (though it can be weird in its own right), the Swedish Chef, or the incredibly long words (that oddly all look like IKEA couch names). It's some of the food that's so odd to me. A land full of delicious fish, unique berries and other things, and yet you get lutefisk. I don't get it. Any time I see a list of Scandinavian foods, my Google skills have to fire on all cylinders, trying to make sure I'm getting a tasty treat, and not some fish that's been soaking in lye in the bottom of a burnt out ditch for the last 5 years so I can eat its rotten, half-dessicated corpse.

But every now and then, you find some food with a funny name, and it's the perfect balance of sweet, salty, savory, and fishy. Sup, gravlax?

Next Up: Gravlax

Looking for an easy way to impress visitors, with as little effort as possible? I've got a Scandinavian appetizer that'll wow your guests. It'll be easy. Trust me, the hardest part of this is finding a brick and wrapping it in foil. I'm serious. Coming soon: Gravlax!

Story Time: Why I'm Not Currently On Fox TV

"The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

-Mark Twain

MasterChef's sixth season began this past week, and already there's been a couple good episodes. The top 20 have been chosen, and it's probably going to be a great season. But I wanted to be there.

MasterChef is a pretty neat concept, to me. You have tens of home cooks that all compete for a big ol' prize (cash, cookbook deals, getting to see the well-worn geography of a notoriously angry Scot's face), during lots of team battles, fights, box challenges, etc. But the thing that stands out to me about this show is that it's all home cooks, like you and I. To be a contestant, you cannot have worked in a kitchen professionally. There are some other weird scenarios that make you ineligible, but that is the main one that seems to keep it pretty fair. So imagine my interest and surprise when I realized that I could not only try out, but that auditions were happening in two nearby cities.

This is the story of my audition, and the bitter realization that you don't see my face on Fox for a few months.

Mango Shrimp Ceviche

"I shall be but a shrimp of an author"

-Thomas Gray

Summer used to be something I really enjoyed. Upper 70s, gentle breeze, not a cloud in the sky; things were great growing up in Portland. But once I ventured out of my homeland, I realized that Summer isn't always the sweet, sweet experience I had always known. Virginia had nothing but humidity; muggy days and humid nights with loud cicadas. And then California? Woof.

The first summer I spent in California, it was considered a "mild' summer. That is to say, most days stayed under 100 degrees. That being said, my office's air conditioner didn't really hit my desk, and most days I'd come home in a moist mess. A pleasant thought, I know. But then came more summers, where there were so many days above 100; I remember the few days where it was 114 at my house. The AC couldn't keep up, so you'd be "cool" inside your 85-degree house. Fun times.

What I'm getting at is that there are some times when you are going to be wondering why ovens exist. Or stoves, grills, or any sort of cooking apparatus. They will seem so unnecessary, so arrogant to be adding heat into the space, that you'll decide that starving is a smarter option. Or switching to an all-beer diet. But worry not, comrade! I have something just for you.