Excess baked potato makes for lovely, light gnocchi and saves on prep time, too
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’m rolling these gnocchi out of yesterday’s leftover baked potato and feeling rather chuffed with myself, because when you’re able to cut out a step from a normally scratch-cook dish such as gnocchi, it makes life easier. Crisp up the leftover potato skins in a pan with sea salt to enjoy as a snack, or freeze them for making loaded potato skins (recipe coming next week).
A great way to make extra-flavourful fluffy pillows of gnocchi is to make them with leftover baked potato. Baking the potatoes instead of boiling them reduces their moisture content, meaning less flour is required, which in turn results in a lighter, less pasty gnocchi. Leftover baked potato also saves about an hour of prep time.
This recipe serves two, using just one leftover baked potato, which I’ve turned into a one-pot wonder with seasonal broad beans, feta and mint. I wouldn’t recommend baking a single potato just for this, not least because the recipe is designed to make use of leftovers. If you’d like to make it from scratch, plan a baked potato meal earlier in the week and make one extra. Otherwise, steaming is a good, efficient alternative.
