Gnochi à la Romaine

Gnochi à la Romaine (Roman-style semolina dumplings) teaches the discipline of setting a starch before cutting it. Cook the semolina fully, spread it evenly, and let it go quite cold. Warm paste slumps under the cutter; cold paste stamps into tender coins with clean edges. That is the one true thing to know before touching the pan.

The book's kitchen needed no saucier and no stockpot for this one, but it did assume broad trays, shallow individual timbales, and a salamander throwing fierce heat down onto the cheese. For four at home, its quart of milk and two-thirds pound of semolina are halved and rounded only to measures a home scale can read. The timbales become one shallow gratin dish, while a hot oven and broiler provide the Rapid Gratin from Gratins (No. 268). Individual portioning is brigade scaffolding and can go; twenty minutes of gentle cooking and the complete chilling are the dish and must stay. One cook, one stove, one evening.

The finished gnochi should be tender and close-grained beneath a mottled crust of Gruyère, Parmesan, and melted butter. Clear a flat shelf in the refrigerator before you begin, then let the tray grow cold all the way through before the cutter meets it.