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More Gnocchi Recipes
Panfried Gnocchi alla Gricia
I love making this panfried gnocchi alla gricia when I’m craving something rich, salty, and satisfying. It’s my twist on the Roman classic, using pillowy gnocchi instead of pasta, panfried until golden in rendered guanciale fat. Tossed with heaps of Pecorino and loads of cracked black pepper, it’s bold, cheesy, and packed with flavour. This is my kind of comfort food - easy, indulgent, and made with just a handful of good-quality ingredients.
Ingredients
- 500g gnocchi
- 125g guanciale, diced
- 1/2 cup finely grated Pecorino Romano
- Freshly cracked black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- In a large non-stick frying pan over medium-low heat, render the guanciale, stirring occasionally, until golden and crisp. This will take around 10-12 minutes. Remove the guanciale with a slotted spoon and set aside. Keep the rendered fat in the pan.
- Add the gnocchi to the pan and fry over medium heat in the guanciale fat. Cook for 6-8 minutes, turning occasionally, until golden and crisp on the outside.
- Divide the gnocchi between four bowls and top with plenty of cracked black pepper, a generous sprinkle of Pecorino Romano, and the crispy guanciale.
- Serve immediately.
Notes
- Gricia is one of Rome's four classic pasta dishes, traditionally made with guanciale, pecorino, and black pepper. This gnocchi version takes the same flavours and makes them even more indulgent with crispy, golden gnocchi.
- Guanciale is cured pork jowl and has a richer, more delicate flavour than bacon or pancetta. You can usually find it at Italian delis or good butchers. If you can't get guanciale, pancetta is the next best substitute.
- I use this large cast iron frying pan for this recipe. It's perfect for rendering the guanciale evenly and getting the gnocchi beautifully crisp without any sticking.
- Take your time rendering the guanciale over medium-low heat. Low and slow is the key to getting it properly crispy while rendering out all that beautiful fat.
- Shelf-stable vacuum-packed gnocchi works brilliantly here and crisps up perfectly in the guanciale fat.
- Pecorino Romano has a sharp, salty bite that's essential to this dish. Don't substitute with Parmesan as the flavour profile is quite different.
- Freshly cracked black pepper is non-negotiable. Use plenty of it. This pepper mill gives you the perfect coarse grind every time.
- For extra authenticity, toss the gnocchi with a tiny splash of pasta water and some of the pecorino before plating to create a light, creamy coating. Just a tablespoon or two will do.
- This dish is rich, so a little goes a long way. The serving size is generous but not huge.
- Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 2 days, though the gnocchi will lose its crispy texture. Reheat gently in a hot frying pan to crisp it up again.
- Not suitable for freezing as the texture of the crispy gnocchi and guanciale won't hold up after defrosting.
What I Cook With
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Nutrition Information:
Yield:
4Serving Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 473Total Fat: 23gSaturated Fat: 9gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 13gCholesterol: 72mgSodium: 1309mgCarbohydrates: 52gFiber: 3gSugar: 1gProtein: 13g
Please note, this nutrition information is to be used as a guide only. Nutrition information isn’t always accurate.
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Gnocchi alla Gricia recipe
Fluffy Winter Days and a Bowl of Gnocchi alla Gricia
It has been a wet and cold week here in Adelaide – the kind that makes you pull your sleeves down over your hands and double-sock your feet just to feel a little more human. I’ve been working late every night, and by the time I get home, it’s too dark and too quiet to really cook anything comforting. So today, I decided to take a proper day for myself. No meetings, no small talk, just me and my emails, drifting across my laptop on the kitchen bench while I pottered around with Lulu curled up on the chair nearby. Gnocchi alla Gricia was the result of this soft, slow day. I was craving something pan-fried and full of flavour, something to bring a little joy into a lonely, fluffy winter afternoon. And honestly, there’s nothing more comforting than gnocchi fried in guanciale fat and tossed with cheese until it all clings together like a big, warm hug.
I’m in my fluffy pyjamas, slippers on, the fake fireplace I bought from Amazon casting that soft amber glow I always find so comforting. The winter sunlight is streaming through the big windows of my townhouse, golden and gentle, and for the first time in days, the rain has stopped. Not forever, I’m sure, but for now. And I needed that. The gnocchi is sizzling on the stove and the whole kitchen smells like pork and pepper and promise. Sometimes I think the act of cooking is what really saves me on days like these. Not because I’m hungry necessarily, but because it gives shape to the shapelessness. Gnocchi alla Gricia is simple and quick, but somehow tastes like you’ve been standing over the stove all day. And that’s the kind of food I need right now. Familiar, forgiving, and full of flavour.
It’s quite healing cooking for yourself with intention, especially when the rest of the world feels too loud. Today, it’s just me, my cat, and this dish. I stand at the kitchen bench, where all my meals happen in this small, informal space, and plate the gnocchi like I’m expecting company. But the only guest today is comfort. That first bite is salty and rich, the guanciale crispy, the gnocchi golden and fluffy. And I can feel the tension of the week slowly start to dissolve. This is what home feels like. Not the walls or the windows, but the moment you let yourself take a breath and eat something delicious you made just for you.
The Fluffy Sous Chef Chronicles
If you’ve been here a while, you already know about Lulu. Lulu is my black fluffy menace slash beloved cat slash kitchen supervisor. Whenever I’m in the kitchen, so is he, and making this recipe was no exception. The second I started chopping the guanciale, he was there. Jumping onto the bench, sniffing at the knife, sticking his nose where it absolutely did not belong. I’d lift him off, he’d jump back up, rinse and repeat until it was basically a ballet of me cooking and him interfering. At one point, I was halfway through setting up my backdrop when Lulu made one small misstep squarely on the board, sending a pile of diced guanciale cascading to the floor. Classic Lulu.
I swore, but I wasn’t mad, of course. He looked up at me with his big green eyes, started mewing softly, absolutely wracked with guilt, and next thing you know I’m on the floor with him giving kisses and pats. After that, he relocated himself to the top of the fridge, where he could supervise from above like a fluffy god surveying his fluffy domain. He stayed up there, purring and swishing his feathery fluffy tail, while I finished the recipe with little to no further incident.
He’s been such an anchor for me, especially during those times when cooking felt more like a chore than a joy. It’s funny how a bit of chaos in the kitchen, courtesy of a curious cat, can make everything feel a little more like home. Even when there’s gnocchi on the floor and chunks of guanciale stuck to the cupboard. It’s all part of it. The cooking, the mishaps, the kitty-cat supervision – it’s what makes the food taste better! And don’t worry, my food is always fur-free!
A Foodland Adventure and Finding Guanciale
Just before the Brisbane trip, my bestie and I went to Pasadena Foodland. It was his birthday gift to me, albeit a belated one for my Taurus-self, but perfectly timed. Now, we both know I prefer experiences over things, and wandering around a fancy supermarket absolutely counts. We’re an odd pair these days, I must admit. After breaking up last year, we decided to stay best friends, and although it’s not the conventional route, it works for us. He knows me, knows how to make me laugh, and our shared love of food makes for very entertaining outings. Pasadena Foodland has a reputation for being outrageously posh – there’s literally a man playing the piano in the deli! And I was of course, overwhelmed and if he hadn’t been with me, I’d have bought half the store!
As we wandered, I managed to steer clear of the cheese section (barely), but then I saw it. Guanciale. Just sitting there like it wasn’t impossible to find in Adelaide. I grabbed it immediately. Bestie was busy loading up on ramen and candy – his food love is very different from mine – and we laughed our way through the aisles. After, we sat down for lunch at the in-store café, where I had a surprisingly good gluten-free burger, and we chatted about everything and nothing. Then we took the scenic route home through the hills, and I went back to mine and stared at the guanciale like it held all the answers.
I thought about carbonara, naturally. But I didn’t want creamy. I wanted something simpler, saltier, a little more serious. And it had been too long since I’d made gnocchi. I love how they crisp up in a hot pan, especially when cooked in rendered pork fat. That night, the idea for Gnocchi alla Gricia took hold. And today, it finally came to life. A little chaotic, a little impulsive, like most of our adventures. But so worth it. This dish came together not from planning but from feeling. From grief, from joy, from the simple act of holding a packet of guanciale and letting yourself dream of comfort food.
Ingredients Breakdown
Gnocchi
Shelf-stable vacuum-packed gnocchi, same as every other pan-fried recipe in this collection. It crisps up reliably and holds together when you turn it in the pan over a longer cook time. This recipe fries the gnocchi for longer than the others, around six to eight minutes, because you want a deeper, more substantial crust to stand up against the intensity of the guanciale and Pecorino. Fresh gnocchi won’t survive that kind of heat for that long.
Guanciale
Guanciale is cured pork jowl, and it is the ingredient this dish is built around. It has a richer, more delicate flavour than bacon or pancetta because the jowl has a higher fat-to-meat ratio and a different fat composition that melts differently in the pan. The whole point of rendering it low and slow over medium-low heat for ten to twelve minutes is to coax out as much of that fat as possible while getting the meat itself properly golden and crisp. That rendered fat is then what you fry the gnocchi in, which means every single piece of gnocchi is coated in flavour before anything else touches it. If you genuinely cannot find guanciale, pancetta is the closest substitute, but it is worth checking Italian delis or a good butcher before you give up.
Pecorino Romano
Pecorino Romano is a sharp, salty, hard cheese made from sheep’s milk, and it is not interchangeable with Parmesan here. The flavour is more assertive and more distinctly savoury in a way that Parmesan simply does not replicate, and in a four-ingredient dish there is nowhere to hide a substitution. Grate it finely so it scatters evenly over the top and hits every bite. For extra indulgence, a tiny splash of pasta water stirred through with some of the Pecorino before plating creates a light, creamy coating on the gnocchi that takes it to another level entirely.
Freshly cracked black pepper
Not optional, not negotiable, and not something you can substitute with pre-ground pepper from a jar. Gricia as a dish is defined by its pepper. It should be coarsely cracked and generous, added over the top just before serving so it stays sharp and present rather than disappearing into the background. A good pepper mill with a coarse setting is the tool you need here. Use more than you think is necessary.
Serve This With
- A simple rocket and radicchio salad with lemon dressing
- Roasted broccolini with garlic and chilli
- Sautéed spinach with a squeeze of lemon
