A first-person account from off the beaten track, as told to Anne Ford.
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“Growing up in Italy, I loved to spend time in the kitchen with my mother. Especially on Sunday, which was our only holiday. We used to make gnocchi many times. We would put big old potatoes—the starchy potatoes you need for gnocchi—in a pressure cooker for about 45 minutes. Then we would take the potatoes out, and I would have to peel them, and that was always excruciating because they were really hot. But you have to do this while they’re hot. You had all these rules you had to follow.
“My husband is American from Ohio, as American as they come. Now he understands the difference, but at first he thought I was crazy when I said, ‘No, you can’t use this kind of sauce with this pasta.’ Now a dish he is crazy for is pasta with squid ink.
