Italian Recipes for Meatless Days – Gnocchi alla Romana

Gnocchi alla Romana

Gnocchi alla RomanaBy 1917, certain foods were in short supply, especially meat, wheat for bread, butter and sugar.  Here is a recipe that appeared in the Bromley & District Times newspaper in January 1917.

I liked the elegant suggestions about serving the Gnocchi alla Romana.

Definitely for the middle-class housewife who maybe has lost her live-in cook!


 

Gnocchi alla Romana

3/4 pint Water
3/4 pint Milk
1/2 pound Semolina
Butter
Grated cheese
Salt.

  1. Boil the semolina in the milk-and-water, with salt to taste for fifteen or twenty minutes, stirring well occasionally to prevent lumps from forming.
  2. Pour out on to a marble slab, or onto a large flat baking dish, and when somewhat cooled cut into squares, circles, or ovals, with a glass cutter
  3. Place the little cakes of semolina (one overlapping the other so as not to leave spaces) in one more well-buttered baking dishes
  4. Sprinkle well with grated cheese, and bake till a delicious brown in fairly hot oven.

Serve hot.

Sufficient for five or six persons.

The dish used for baking must be a sightly one, as it has to appear on the table; copper or earthenware chafing dishes are the best, placed with a serviette under, on a large plate or dish.

Gnocchi alla Romana

 

NB
2 pints = 1.1 litres
0.75 pints = 0.4 litres
2 oz (ounces) = 57 grams

Many people were still cooking over a fire in 1917

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