Warning, Gnocchi Obsession Ahead- Gnoccheria Review

Gnocchi is definitely one of the weirdest words in the dictionary to me. It's also so hard to pronounce correctly! But it represents one of the most delicious pastas out there. Little balls of potato and flour drenched in flavorful sauce- yum! New York recently welcomed its first restaurant dedicated to gnocchi- Gnoccheria. Gnoccheria is owned by the same owners as the wildly successful pizza place, Luzzo's (which I have sadly not tried yet). While they do have other pastas on the menu, Gnoccheria's most famous dishes is their namesake. They offer 3 different types of gnocchi, plus two different types of stuffed gnocchi, and over 10 different styles of sauce. It's enough to make any girl SUPER excited for dinner! I rated Gnoccheria 4 toasts.

I"m probably getting gasps of shock from every person that has eaten at Gnoccheria and comments that it should be 5 toasts, not 4. There's no argument that the food here is beyond mouthwatering, but the main reason why I deducted a toast is because the restaurant only fills up its tables through advanced reservations and doesn't leave any tables open for walk ins. What is the point of having yummy food if no one can eat it? Or if people have to wait for weeks/months just to get a table? I understand the point of only reserved tables if its fine dining because you want the more upscale exclusive atmosphere, but Gnoccheria is very casual so there is no reason why it can't leave a few tables open for walk in diners so everyone can en joy their wonderful food. My friends and I were lucky because while we did not make a reservation, we arrived just as it opened at 5pm and we promised to finish eating within an hour so that the table could free up for a 6pm reservation. This turned out to be no problem for us because we were starving and the gnocchi was so good that we actually finished our meal within 30 minutes.

Before I speak about the actual food, I want to preface by saying that I LOVE options when it comes to food. I loved getting to "create" my own dish by mixing and matching the gnocchi options with the sauce options. It allowed me to pinpoint exactly what I wanted to eat. That being said, because of all the different options I was obviously unable to try different types of combinations for the purposes of this review. I ordered the spinach gnocchi with salmon and asparagus cream and my friends ordered the stuffed mushroom gnocchi with carbonara and the purple potato gnocchi with four cheese. Personally, I felt like my spinach with salmon and asparagus tasted the best because it was the right balance of flavors. There were tiny bits of salmon and asparagus in the cream sauce, which added to the variation of flavor. But there wasn't giant pieces of both, which would have overwhelmed the dish. Plus, the sauce wasn't overly cheesy or creamy which can be a turn off for me (and my slightly lactose intolerant stomach). I really liked chewing the gnocchi, although I couldn't really pick out the spinach flavor. The good thing about gnocchi is that its not messy to eat, unlike spaghetti or fettuccine, so it is a safe date option. The patio is super cute and we all enjoyed sitting outside in the breeze with our food.

I can't wait to go back to Gnoccheria and try a totally different combination of gnocchi and sauce! That's probably one of the best perks of this restaurant!