I feel it’s important to state that this is totally not a Mexican recipe and I make no claims of authenticity, mainly so my friend Paulina won’t be mad at me for perpetuating the various bad imitations of Mexican food that abound (not that this will stop me from sending her pictures when I encounter things like the “Mexican mac ‘n’ cheese” I had in the north of England of course).

Lets call it pseudo-Mexican. Or Mexican inspired. Or we could call it Fusion if we were feeling fancy. I originally made it as an improvisation, but then I made it again because it was tasty.

Ingredients:

• 500g Gnocchi (I told you it wasn’t Mexican)
• 3 cans red kidney beans
• 3 medium sized onions
• 4 medium sweet peppers (I used a mix or red, orange and yellow)
• 1 small red chilli pepper
• Ground cumin
• Dry Oregano
• Hot smoked paprika
• Salt
• Black pepper
• Vegetable oil for frying

The spice quantities are problematic because I still haven’t measured them out. The ratios are about twice as much cumin as oregano and twice as much oregano as paprika. I’d guess that it’s about 2-3 tbsp of cumin, but I’d recommend tinkering with the levels until it’s tasty.

Cooking is simple:

Dice the onions and peppers (including the chilli pepper), put them into a frying pan with hot oil and salt to fry. Stir, and once the onion has gone translucent, add the spices. Keep stirring for about another 10 minutes, add the kidney beans (drained), stir for another ten minutes, add the Gnocchi, and you guessed it stir for another 10 minutes.

By that point the kidney beans should have broken up a bit but the gnocchi will mostly have kept its structure. The result is a fairly thick mush that will hold together quite well.

The first time we ate this we just had it in bowls with guacamole on the side. The second time we put it in corn tortillas with some salsa verde as well and that worked a lot better, though both ways were pretty good.