Ingredients
1 tablespoonful of rice per person
1 tablespoon of olive oil
Freshly ground black
Salt
A teaspoonful of lemon juice or wine vinegar
Chopped or crushed garlic
A few shavings ? very thin ? of onion
Grated raw carrot
Shredded raw green peppers
Tunny fish
1 anchovy
Finely chopped green olives
Whole black olives
Minced cold chicken
Mushrooms, raw or cooked in equal quantities.
Fresh peeled shrimps or prawns
Freshly chopped parsley
Cooked green peas or French beans
Chopped celery hearts
Chopped fennel
A few blanched and chopped almonds or pine nuts
Directions
Really delicious antipasti can be concocted starting with a basis of plain boiled rice.
Allow one tablespoonful of rice per person, and boil in salted water as directed under the heading of 'RICE'. Drain, and before it is quite cold season with a tablespoon of olive oil to each tablespoonful of uncooked rice, freshly ground black pepper, more salt if needed, and a teaspoonful of lemon juice or wine vinegar, plus a suspicion of finely chopped or crushed garlic, or a few shavings ? very thin ? of onion. Allow to become quite cold, then mix with any of the following, or a combination of two or three of them: Grated raw carrot ? using half as much carrot as rice.
Finely shredded raw green peppers ? quantity as for carrot.
Tunny fish broken small with a fork, equal quantities of fish and rice, and even better with the addition of one anchovy per tablespoonful of tunny fish. Finely chopped green olives, half as much as rice. Whole black olives, four or five per tablespoonful of rice. Minced cold chicken, equal quantities with rice. Mushrooms, raw or cooked in equal quantities. Fresh peeled shrimps or prawns, or if available, scampi, and to enhance these, add also a generous amount of freshly chopped parsley and a few cooked green peas or French beans.
Chopped celery hearts, finely chopped fennel, finely sliced pre-served artichoke hearts in equal quantities with the rice, are three other alternatives, and with these try the addition of a few blanched and chopped almonds or pine nuts.
Using the foregoing suggestions as a basis, you should be able to utilise left-over boiled rice to good advantage to produce an interesting hors d'oeuvre.
Notes
The recipe in this entry comes from "Italian Cooking" by Dorothy Daly was published by Spring Books in London, England. For the complete copyright-free text see www.archive.org. The author starts her chapter with the following note: "Antipasti is the name given to the large variety of tit-bits, or hors d'oeuvres which, in a truly Italian household, are served as a prelude to pasta or soup. They may consist of a few wafer-thin slices of salami with a garnish of a couple of anchovies and a few black olives, or they may be considerably more elaborate, but whatever their nature they must be interesting to look at and appetising to taste. Some of the following suggestions may fill you with apprehension; for instance, boiled rice combined with grated carrots, or the slice of ham to be eaten with an ice cold slice of honeydew melon, or with a couple of ripe figs, but taste and try, and you'll probably come back for more." Image: 1897 Italian Menu from The New York Public Digital Library.
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