Crispy Gnocchi with Lemon, Peas, and Asparagus - #recipe by @LeslieBudewitz

LESLIE BUDEWITZ:  My spring fling with bright colors and flavors continues. 

We adore gnocchi, the tender little Italian potato dumplings. We learned to make them in a cooking class in Florence a few years ago, and while it was yummy and surprisingly easy, we tend to default to commercial varieties, not dried but shelf-stable, in one-pound packages. Last summer, I spotted a description of a dish using pan-fried gnocchi instead of the typical boiled version; lacking a recipe, I made my own – Crispy Gnocchi with Burst Tomatoes and Mozzarella. It’s now a staple, and its success made me eager to try this recipe, which is just as good. 

Bonus: Both recipes are as quick and easy as they are pretty and yummy.

Lemon zest gives just the brightness the vegetables crave, without the pucker factor. Use the thinnest young asparagus spears you can find. 

Serve with a green salad, crusty bread, and crisp white wine. Bon Appetivo! 

What's on your menu tonight?

PS: I finally figured out how to embed a PDF of the recipe for easy printing. Scroll down to the 💕 for the link.

Crispy Gnocchi with Lemon, Peas, and Asparagus 

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

16 ounces gnocchi (fresh or frozen; no need to thaw)

12-16 ounces asparagus, washed, trimmed, and cut into 1-inch pieces

1 cup peas (fresh or frozen; no need to thaw) 

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

4 basil leaves, chopped OR ½ teaspoon dried basil

1 tablespoon fresh lemon zest

splash of white wine or chicken broth for deglazing

4 ounces grated Parmesan, plus more for serving 

Melt the butter in a large sauté pan over medium heat. When the butter bubbles, add the gnocchi  and cook until lightly browned, about 2-3 minutes a side. Remove gnocchi from pan and set aside. If potato bits have stuck to the bottom of the pan, scrape them up but leave them in the pan. 

Add the asparagus and peas. Toss and cook for 3-5 minutes, until the asparagus is tender. Add the salt, pepper, basil, and lemon zest.

Return the gnocchi to the pan, and mix well. Taste and adjust seasonings, if needed. 

Remove from heat. Stir in the Parmesan and serve immediately, with a bowl of grated cheese for topping.

Serves 4.

💕 Click here for a free printable PDF! 

At Seattle Spice Shop, owner Pepper Reece has whipped up the perfect blend of food, friends, and flavor. But the sweet smell of success can be hazardous . . .  

Spring is in full bloom in Pike Place Market, where Pepper is celebrating lavender’s culinary uses and planning a festival she hopes will become an annual event. When her friend Lavender Liz offers to share tips for promoting the much-loved—and occasionally maligned—herb, Pepper makes a trek to the charming town of Salmon Falls. But someone has badly damaged Liz’s greenhouse, throwing a wrench in the feisty grower’s plans for expansion. Suspicions quickly focus on an employee who’s taken to the hills. 

Then Liz is found dead among her precious plants, stabbed by a pruning knife. In Salmon Falls, there’s one in every pocket. 

Pepper digs in, untangling the tensions between Liz and a local restaurateur with eyes on a picturesque but neglected farm, a jealous ex-boyfriend determined to profit from Liz’s success, and a local growers’ cooperative. She’s also hot on the scent of a trail of her own, sniffing out the history of her sweet dog, Arf. 

As Pepper’s questions threaten to unearth secrets others desperately want to keep buried, danger creeps closer to her and those she loves. Can Pepper root out the killer, before someone nips her in the bud?

Available at Amazon * Barnes & Noble * Books-A-Million * Bookshop.org * and your local booksellers!

ALL GOD'S SPARROWS AND OTHER STORIES: A STAGECOACH MARY FIELDS COLLECTION, now available in in paperback and ebook 

Take a step back in time with All God's Sparrows and Other Stories: A Stagecoach Mary Fields Collection of historical short mysteries, featuring the Agatha-Award winning "All God's Sparrows" and other stories imagining the life of real-life historical figure Mary Fields, born into slavery in 1832, during the last thirty years of her life, in Montana. Out September 17, 2024 from Beyond the Page Publishing.  

“Finely researched and richly detailed, All God’s Sparrows and Other Stories is a wonderful collection. I loved learning about this fascinating woman . . . and what a character she is! Kudos to Leslie Budewitz for bringing her to life so vividly.” —Kathleen Grissom, New York Times bestselling author of Crow Mary

Available at Amazon * Barnes & Noble * Books-A-Million * Bookshop.org * and your local booksellers!

Leslie Budewitz is the author of the Spice Shop Mysteries set in Seattle's Pike Place Market, and the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries, set in NW Montana. As Alicia Beckman, she writes moody, standalone suspense, most recently Blind Faith. She is the winner of Agatha Awards in three categories: Best Nonfiction (2011), Best First Novel (2013), and Best Short Story (2018). Her latest books are To Err is Cumin, the 8th Spice Shop Mystery and All God's Sparrows and Other Stories: A Stagecoach Mary Fields Collection, in September 2024. Watch for Lavender Lies Bleeding, the 9th Spice Shop Mystery, on July 15, 2025.

A past president of Sisters in Crime and former national board member of Mystery Writers of America, Leslie lives in northwest Montana with her husband, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their cat, an avid bird-watcher.

Swing by Leslie's website and join the mailing list for her seasonal newsletter. And join her on Facebook where she shares book news and giveaways from her writer friends, and talks about food, mysteries, and the things that inspire her.

Peas with Garlic and Parmesan #Recipe Peg Cochran/Margaret Loudon

 

I always have meat in my freezer.  I buy family packs of chicken breasts, chicken thighs and boneless chicken thighs, ground turkey and ground beef.  I divide the packages into portions for two.  Consequently, I always have meat to build dinner around.  But what sends me to the grocery store more often than not is the need for some sort of vegetable.  Frozen peas to the rescue! I always have a bag on hand and they are the perfect accompaniment to almost any meal from serving as a side dish to being added to shepherd's pie.  But sometimes plain peas can be...boring.  However, they are easy to "jazz" up!  This is just one recipe that can turn peas from ordinary to extraordinary! (Below are the original quantities. I adapted them  to serve only two people.)

 

PEAS WITH GARLIC AND PARMESAN

1 tablespoon olive oil 

 1 shallot - peeled and diced

 3 cloves garlic - pressed or minced

 2 cups sweet peas - frozen peas, thawed

 ¼ cup aged Parmesan - freshly grated, more to taste

Salt and pepper to taste 

Heat olive oil in skillet and add shallots.  Sauté until beginning to soften.  Add garlic and cook until garlic is just beginning to take on color.

 

Add peas and cook until peas are heated.

 

Remove from heat and stir in Parmesan.

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Peg Cochran is the author of the Open Book Series (writing as Margaret Loudon), the Cranberry Cove Series, the Murder, She Repored series, the Farmer's Daughter Series, the Lucille series and the Sweet Nothings Lingerie Series (writing as Meg London.)

Chilled Pea Soup

by Sheila Connolly

I just returned from a whirlwind week-long trip that included two book signings and visits with various friends and relatives along the way.  It was both exhausting and energizing: I drove over a thousand miles and never stayed in one place for longer than one night.  But it’s wonderful to revisit places I once knew well (and use in my books!) and to explore new ones. It’s also lovely that those nice friends and relatives take me out to eat in places I would never find on my own.

One of these was Sascha’s 527 Café, a mid-size restaurant in downtown Baltimore. It was a wet and stormy night, and there were eight of us at the table, so we tried a range of dishes, all good. I would write about the duck quesadilla I had, which involved duck confit and goat cheese, but there’s not a chance in the world that I could replicate it. But I had a delightful appetizer than is much simpler to make, so I will take a stab at imitating it (the sincerest form of flattery, right?). It’s perfect for a hot summer day.

Sascha's soup

It’s chilled sweet pea soup. The recipe is ridiculously easy, with only a few ingredients, and it has an interesting twist: orange slices. Yes, I know, I was skeptical when I read the menu, but it worked.

Obviously the central ingredient is peas, but peas have a short season, and this was mid-June. However, I did find a nice batch of sugar snap peas (which I love) at a farmer’s roadside stand in New Jersey—picked that very morning, he swore—so I decided I would use those.

CHILLED SWEET PEA SOUP

1 pound of peas (you could use frozen peas, if they’re small and sweet)

1 cup chicken broth

1 cup milk/cream/buttermilk

Salt to taste

The cleaned segments of one small sweet orange (you can substitute canned mandarin oranges if you want)

Simmer the peas in the broth, covered, for 5-10 minutes. Do not overcook—you want them to stay tender. Transfer the mixture to a blender, food processor or food mill and puree.  Add the milk. Taste for seasoning and add salt if you like. Chill. (I told you it was easy!)

When you’re ready to serve, lay a few orange slices in the bottom of each bowl and ladle the soup over them (they’ll stay on the bottom as a surprise for any guests). Garnish with a spritz of cream or crème fraiche, and pea greens if you have any (they’re long past around here).

(Okay, I'll work on my decorating technique--
but it still tastes good!)

And here's the reason for the grand tour--Razing the Dead, released June 3rd. Which also explains why I was standing in Pennsylvania battlefields in the pouring rain (research). Not to mention following "Marty Terwilliger" around Philadelphia. I can swear that she (the real person, not the character) really does know everyone in Philadelphia and the surrounding counties, from street vendors to society matrons--because we talked to a lot of them! By the way, the "real" Marty is tickled pink to be part of the series, and is looking forward to meeting her new boyfriend (no spoilers--you'll have to read the book!).