It was 33 degrees out when I left for work this morning. In the dark. In my full-length down coat. 33. People. I am not ready for this. One of the things we love most about New England is the fall, and I feel like it’s almost behind us, whizzing past like the vibrant foliage as I head home on the train in the evening, in the dark.

The change of seasons is always difficult for me physically, and this rapid drop in temperatures, the cold and damp, is particularly hard. I have no energy and I ache right to my core, and of course, I’m reacting by taking on Projects in the kitchen. Like these gnudi.

The last time I made gnudi was far too long ago, and since we have some of the best darned ricotta around, I figured it was high time I worked with it in this application.

I treated the ricotta much like I did in my most recent batch of ricotta gnocchi, draining it and beating it until fluffy, then incorporating chopped cooked chard, a beaten egg, salt, pepper, lemon zest, grated parm, and flour. I rolled out two dozen little dumplings, cooked them in plenty of boiling salted water until they bobbed to the top, then sauced them with a zippy lemon and thyme-infused butter, finishing them with crunchy little lemon-thyme breadcrumbs. It was, perhaps, a little fussy for a weeknight dish, but it was totally worth it, a welcome bright spot in an otherwise dreary day.

Some of you may remember this tart, which was apparently so tempting that some guy decided to pass it off as his own. Well, the minute I laid eyes on these heirloom tomatoes at Arcadian Fields’ table at the Saturday market (which weren’t on my shopping list but were too gorgeous to pass up, and you bet I swooped right in and bought the last of them), I knew I wanted to make it again.

I changed a few things up this time to account for what we had on hand, and I think that though it added a few steps to the original version, it was a superior one.

The base was Clotilde’s olive oil tart crust – our go-to, of late, which Mike prepared and baked ahead of time. The creamy layer was a mixture of our favorite ricotta, creme fraiche, a little freshly grated Pecorino Romano, a pinch of salt, and chopped fresh herbs – flat-leaf parsley, basil and thyme.

After I layered the sliced tomatoes over the top of the cheese-spread tart crust, I gave it another liberal dusting of grated Pecorino and scattered on the remainder of my chopped herbs. At that point, all that was left to do was toss a little salad, fill our wine glasses, slice the tart and serve.

And that’s what summer dining is all about.

I’m a big fan of sausage. Some of the stuff that’s out there is suspect, filled with preservatives and other things you probably don’t want to think about, but if you can get your hands on the good stuff from a producer you trust (or, even better, if you make your own), you’ll be amazed at the things you can do with it.

When it comes down to it, sausage is just meat – pork, or chicken, or turkey, or whatever – that is ground up and already seasoned for you. Remove it from the casing and use it just as you would any other ground meat. It’s incredibly versatile, and a great building block for quick dinners.

These might be the easiest meatballs I’ve ever made, and considering the sounds my husband was making as he ate, they just might be the tastiest. I took a pound of sweet Italian sausage (from Pat’s Pastured), removed it from its casing, and combined it with a cup of drained ricotta, a little salt, and an egg. I mixed everything together with my hands until it was well combined, then incorporated some fresh breadcrumbs (from two slices of soft multi-grain bread, pulsed in the food processor until the crumbs were slightly smaller than peas).

I formed the mixture into gumball-sized meatballs, and rolled each of them in a little bit of Wondra, then shallow-fried them in batches in about half an inch of olive oil.

I served the meatballs in shallow bowls with cooked farro and a parmesan broth with thinly sliced scallions and lots of fresh herbs, finishing each serving with a little smoked paprika and parm shavings.

The meatballs were crisp on the outside and almost meltingly tender in the middle thanks to the addition of the ricotta, and because they were made with sausage, they were seasoned perfectly throughout. I love when a meal with this much flavor takes so little time and effort to put together.

This post has been a long time coming. After getting down reliably good versions of both potato gnocchi and ricotta gnudi over the years, it was downright annoying that I just couldn’t seem to turn out a good version of ricotta gnocchi. I have gotten so many wonderful recommendations from people as far as recipes and methods to try out, and time and again I ended up frustrated, with something that hit short of the mark.

I took a few days off work at the end of the week, a much-needed break from routine and a chance to step back, take a deep breath, and recharge my batteries. I also decided that, with time on my hands and plenty of fresh ricotta at my disposal, I would give ricotta gnocchi one last try before the weather turns too warm for it. I was determined this time to get it right.

I looked back at what went wrong with my previous attempts, and the notes I had made thereafter, and I adjusted my technique accordingly. What I ended up with, to my delight, was a pretty darned perfect batch of gnocchi, light and fluffy, with enough structural integrity to hold up through the cooking process and no hint of chewiness.

Most of the recipes I consulted are written to serve six, so I figured scaling back and working with a smaller quantity of dough would be beneficial. For this batch, I started with one cup of ricotta (our favorite, from Narragansett Creamery), drained overnight in a strainer, wrapped in a double layer of cheesecloth.

I incorporated one farm egg (the eggs we get at the farmers market are all different sizes, but I’d say the one I used here, from Zephyr Farm, was in the extra-large-to-jumbo range), a pinch of kosher salt, a few tablespoons of freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano, and probably 1/3 to 1/2 cup of flour, setting aside a little extra to form the gnocchi. I ended up with enough gnocchi for two generous servings.

Hand-rolling individual gnocchi, rather than rolling out a log of the dough and cutting it into segments, worked well here, with each little dumpling getting only as much handling as it needed. Also helpful: setting the formed gnocchi in the fridge for an hour or so on a sheet pan to firm up before cooking.

The biggest lesson, I think, was to just pay attention to the ingredients, to not worry about how much or little flour I should be adding, but rather, how much the mixture needed.

It took time and a lot of persistence, but I think I’ve finally ended up with a ricotta gnocchi I can be happy with.

(Full photoset here)

Over the weekend, I made plans to again attempt a batch of ricotta gnocchi. Finding a good recipe is a bit of an ongoing project for me, and Judy Rogers’ version in the Zuni Cafe Cookbook came very highly recommended, so I figured I’d give it a whirl. Unfortunately, even though I drained my super-fresh ricotta for two whole days in cheesecloth in the fridge, and tried other ways to correct the batter, my testers were slippery, gelatinous, and inedible. But I had so much of the mixture left, I couldn’t bear to just toss it; instead I tucked it into a container in the fridge and tried to decide how to use it.

During the day on Thursday, Mike pulled the remaining meat from last weekend’s roast chicken carcass and made a pot of stock. That stock was finished by the time I got home from work, and since I didn’t have anything planned for dinner, I decided to make a quick chicken soup. I chunked up the meat Mike had set aside and added it to the stock, along with some diced carrot and thin slices of celery. We had a couple of lemons which were looking a little shriveled, so I added their juice to the pot as well. I adjusted the salt and let the whole thing come to a simmer. Then I remembered the batter.

I pulled it out of its container, tipped it into a bowl, and stirred it up. It had firmed up a bit as it sat in the fridge, but I wanted to give it a little more heft, so I added some flour, beating it in a little at a time, until the dough was as stiff as I wanted it to be. I think I put in between 1/4 and 1/3 cup total.

The carrots were tender and the soup was done, so I raised the heat just a bit as I formed golf-ball sized rounds of the dough. I gently tipped them into the soup and let them cook for 5 or 10 minutes, and was really happy to see that they were holding together beautifully. I ladled the soup and dumplings into deep bowls, added a generous amount of fresh dill, and we ate.

The soup itself was bright and tasty, but the dumplings were amazing – light, fluffy and super-tender, not leaden at all. The little bit of lemon zest that I had added to the original batter still came through, which was a nice accent to the lemony broth. I was so pleased with these that I might just forget about mastering ricotta gnocchi altogether and focus on how I can play with these dumplings… like adding some chopped fresh herbs, perhaps?

Mastering ricotta gnocchi has been a bit of an ongoing project for me. I love the idea of having a lighter version than the classic potato gnocchi in my arsenal, and we get such delicious fresh ricotta from Louella that I want to use it whenever possible. So I’m sad to report that this latest attempt, while not the epic FAIL of my last try, still missed the mark.

This was another situation, I think, where following a recipe doesn’t always produce perfect results. The source is one I trust: my beloved Sunday Suppers at Lucques. I used the proportions indicated (2 cups of AP flour, 2 beaten eggs, 1 lb. of ricotta, drained overnight in a cheesecloth-lined strainer, salt, pepper), and the mixture was so wet that it was unworkable. I had to add at least another cup of flour to the mix just to get it to a point where it didn’t adhere in gobs to my fingers and any surface it touched, which left me with a much denser dough than I presume the recipe intended.

I pressed forward and blanched the little dumplings in batches, tossing them with a slick of olive oil after fishing them from the boiling water, and I served them with a light and slightly spicy tomato-butter sauce. They were tasty for sure, and not leaden, starchy blobs like the last batch I made, but they had a bit more chew than I would have liked. Still, I’m not going to give up on my mission – I have every intention of trying again, and if you have any favorite tips, tricks or go-to recipes for making ricotta gnocchi to suggest, I’d love to hear them.