Gnocchi Verde

This recipe comes from the Railroad Cafe in Humble, Texas ( pronounced "Umble"- don't ask me why). It was in an October 2004 food section of the Houston Chronicle. You can keep these spinach dumplings in the refrigerator- just heat and serve with butter and grated Parmesan cheese or your favorite marinara sauce. They freeze well too!

• Ready In: 1 hr 10 mins
• Yields: 18 dumplings

Ingredients

• 2 (20 ounce) bags  cleaned salad-ready spinach
• 1⁄2 teaspoon salt
• 3⁄4 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
• 1⁄8 teaspoon nutmeg (two pinches)
• 1 1⁄2 cups ricotta cheese
• 1⁄2 cup all-purpose flour
• 4  large eggs
• 5  tablespoons  chilled butter (butter must be hard so it does not clarify during cooking)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cook spinach.(An easy way is to microwave washed, lightly dampened spinach 1 minute at a time, stir and microwave another minute if necessary). Chill spinach.
3. Put ricotta cheese in a sieve to drain away all excess liquid.
4. Completely squeeze all water out of cooled spinach (press in a colander, then squeeze through a clean kitchen towel) to achieve 2 cups tightly packed, squeeze-dried spinach.
5. Break spinach up in a mixing bowl.
6. Add salt, pepper,nutmeg, drained ricotta cheese, parmesan cheese, flour, eggs, and chilled butter and mix with a wooden spoon.
7. Transfer spinach mixture to a lightly greased baking pan.
8. Cover with foil and bake for 20 minutes.
9. Remove from oven and stir mixture in pan. Return to oven for another 25 minutes.
10. Remove from oven and stir again.
11. Cover and let sit for about 15 minutes to cool down.
12. When cool, put covered pan in refrigerator.
13. When mixture is cool enough to handle, roll into golf-ball-size dumplings in the palm of your hand.
14. Freeze until ready to serve or keep in the refrigerator for a few days.
15. To serve, reheat dumplings at 350 degrees for about 5 minutes or microwave on high for about 1 minute per dumpling.