Getting in the mix

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Kathleen Valle is a self-proclaimed "contest person," with her specialty being in the kitchen. Her recipes for a Pizza Dip and Lentil Salad were published in Kraft magazine’s Family Circle and made her $100 richer. Valle’s Pasta Fritters, which she thought "were terrible," won a B101-FM contest and has been published in the hardback cookbook, "A Taste of Home."

But this time around, when the at-home chef habitually typed "recipe contest" into the search engine Google, a more distinctive prize stood out in Italian-based wine company Marchesi de Frescobaldi’s "Tuscany to You" contest. After 22 years of cooking for her own family, Valle’s recipe for a gnocchi dish may finally get her the chance to eat an authentic, home-cooked meal prepared by accomplished Italian chef Donatella Zampoli, who would fly to Philadelphia from her native country.

To enter the competition, the 69-year-old had to submit an original Italian recipe. Each entry is displayed at www.tuscanytonight.com, where visitors can vote for their favorite. Balloting will cease July 31, when Zampoli will review the top-10 finalists’ recipes and decide which one is truly the tastiest.

Valle had been ranked first for a number of weeks, but has subsequently fallen to third place as of press time. Regardless, she remains in the running, but she had gotten comfortable.

"It was nice to be No. 1," she said sheepishly while sitting in her dining room, with her hair swept in to a side ponytail.

Still lobbying for votes, she said the toughest part was deciding what recipe to submit. Entertaining the idea of a gnocchi dish, Valle enlisted a personal team of experts: her best friends since kindergarten. Out of the 12, some of the group of 69- and 70-year-olds have passed away or moved out of Philadelphia, seven remain in the area and serve as her most reliable critics.

"We’ve been having lunch once a month for a long time and I cooked [the gnocchi recipe] for them and they loved it," Valle, of the 2600 block of Dudley Street, said over a Friday lunch in her home where she prepared her entry, Gnocchi a la Valle.

"I wanted to make something real Italian, "she added

Though Valle’s grandparents were from Italy, her mother didn’t cook a lot of it when she was younger. Rather, it was her late husband Jerry and his Italian mother Enes Valle who encouraged her to go Italiano in the cucina.

"When I first got married, I didn’t know how to cook," she said. "The first veal cutlet I made was like a piece of petrified wood!"

Valle has come a long way since that original piece of rock-hard food. Gnocchi a la Valle calls for two pounds of homemade or frozen gnocchi, but she always makes her pasta from scratch.

"It’s not hard," she said as she removed a bag of frozen gnocchi from her refrigerator that was prepared the night before, "but I’m always in the kitchen."

Though Valle cooked for her three children as they were growing up, there has undoubtedly been a ripple effect as they’ve entered adulthood.

Oldest son Michael, 46, helped generate votes for his mother’s recipe by encouraging 300 of his customers at M&T Bank, 17th Street and Rittenhouse Square, to visit the Web site and cast a ballot for her in a company newsletter. Son John, 42, still takes advantage of his mother’s skills at .

Valle said daughter Valerie, 38, is not like her in the kitchen, but her 10-year-old granddaughter Alyssa is developing into a foodie at an early age.

"She loves Rachael Ray," Valle said, retrieving an envelope full of photos of her recent trip to Florida, where her daughter lives with her family.

Alyssa is shown smiling, wearing a chef hat and holding a mixing bowl.

The fact Valle still enjoys cooking after 48 years — her husband was the guinea pig for several years before her children were born — shows she demonstrates characteristics Zampoli’s considers essential to be an effective and talented chef.

"Of course a good chef needs to be creative and have the talent to combine flavors," Zampoli said via an e-mail, "[but] you need to always put passion and love into your cooking!"

To vote for Kathleen’s Valle’s Gnocchi a la Valle, visit www.tuscanytonight.com by July 31.

Kathleen’s Gnocchi a la Valle

Ingredients:
2 pounds of homemade or frozen gnocchi, cooked until the pasta floats to the top
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup of pancetta, diced
Enough olive oil to coat the bottom of a sauté pan, and another 1/2 cup for the mixture
1/4 cup of fresh basil, sliced
1 cup of calamati olives, diced
1 cup of roasted red bell peppers, diced
Grated Romano cheese, for garnish
Crushed red pepper flakes, to taste

Directions:
Sauté the garlic and pancetta in the oil. Add the basil, olives and peppers.

Strain the gnocchi and add the oil. Mix well. Sprinkle with the cheese and crushed red pepper.