Antipasto via the internet

If you Google on the term homemade crackers, you will find the same three recipes I did. Follow one of them instead of incorporating three as I did. They gave me too many choices! I could use any of several grains or mix them. I could cook them on flour, on cornmeal or on paper. I could press innumerable things onto the tops. They could be spread with oily fingers or rolled with a rolling pin, or even with a pasta roller. I did practically all of the above except the pasta roller.

The thing is, I never keep crackers around, unless you count Wasa Wafers which I don’t. Wasa Wafers Integrale are the only form of bread a low carber can both buy in Italy and eat in moderarion. That removes them neatly from snackfood categories. So making crackers at home sounds like the right thing to do, and I did.

These are raw and are to show you what is the right thickness, the rosemary ones; and what is too thick, the sesame ones. I had the best luck spreading the dough with my oily fingers. They came out nicely thin. They all tasted good when they were done, but the thinnest were the better texture. Besides these two I also made black pepper ones and crushed red chili ones. All had fancy French gray salt on top as well. My favorites were the red chili ones, but they were all good.

Will I make them again? I’m not sure. They are easy, quick and tasty, fairly healthy because I used only extra virgin olive oil in the making, but there is a drawback. They make the house stink for several hours. Hot oil and burnt flour stink. It was not nice. I did not take any “done” photos. I thought I did, but perhaps the camera didn’t like the smell either?

Our antipasto was those crackers and the following cheeses. Two are from December 2008, right her on Think On It, but instead of plating individual servings I made forms on serving plates and garnished them each with something I thought went well.

Goat’s cheese mousse with toasted chopped pecans

Sheep’s ricotta mousse with fried radicchio

Layered formaggio forte, basil and mascarpone

That last one can be made of any tasty cheeses. You can use a processor or a mini chopper and it is just 8 ounces of various cheeses (I used up ends of 3 cheeses left over) with one small clove of garlic, 1/2 cup/125 ml of white wine, with salt and pepper to taste. Once mixed it needs to meld a few hours. Then to make this popular torta, line a bowl or a mold with plastic wrap, then layer in the cheese, some mascarpone and then basil leaves. Keep doing it until it’s full, ending with basil. Cover tightly, chill for a while and then unmold as shown. Garnish it with more basil leaves, et voila!

I thought this was a nice antipasto. It was all made a couple of days before and just plated up on Easter Sunday. Only the garnishes were “cooked” at all, and they were all done in the same tiny non-stick frying pan, so no worries there. It gave everybody something to fiddle with at their plate, picking which of this and what of that, and we drank Prosecco with this course. Both the business and the wine help make the table chatty and bright, which is just the way I like it.

Obviously, this would also make ideal cocktail party food, if you could convince Italians to stand up and drink and eat little things with their fingers. If you can, then you’re a better man than I, Gunga Din. But if you find some Norwegians around, go ahead amd make this. They’ll like it.