![](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.denverpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/TDP-L-FE23ITALIANFLAGANTIPASTI1.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nGot a great chuckle one day when a patron at a supermarket deli counter said to the clerk, \u201cMan, I need to go on a diet. Give me some of that anti-pasta,\u201d the \u201canti\u201d said as in \u201canti-aging.\u201d<\/p>\n
Given our American culinary history, it was an understandable booboo on the Italian word \u201cantipasto,\u201d which translates verbatim as \u201cbefore the meal\u201d \u2014 and, to clarify, means neither \u201cbefore the pasta\u201d nor, certainly, \u201copposed to it.\u201d<\/p>\n
We call nibbles \u201cnibbles\u201d and snacks \u201csnacks\u201d and about anything more formal \u201cappetizers,\u201d that latter word giving a good clue to what are, in truth, antipasti (the plural of antipasto). They arouse or stimulate the appetite, especially for what\u2019s to come, the \u201cpasto,\u201d or main meal.<\/p>\n
Other cultures offer similar pre-meal invigorants. The French call their antipasto an \u201chors d\u2019oeuvre\u201d (word for word, \u201coutside the main event\u201d); those in the Levant and Greece have a long tradition of \u201cmezze\u201d; and no Russian meal is without its prefigurement of \u201czakuski.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some suggest that Spanish tapas or Venetian cicchetti are antipasti, but I disagree (mildly) because these small plates are served much less frequently in homes or restaurants than at bars or taverns, and are generally eaten while standing up. They\u2019re culinary quickies, sometimes in place of a meal itself.<\/p>\n
However, even in Italy itself which, let\u2019s be honest, has not only given the name \u201cantipasti\u201d to the West but also defined most of its ways and means, the term was not much in use until the late 1800s. You won\u2019t find many older Italian cookbooks calling what we call foods such as bruschetta, crostini, sliced meats or salted fish and the like \u201cantipasti.\u201d<\/p>\n
They might call them \u2014 or foods like them, such as a cup of soup or a few oysters \u2014 \u201cprincipii\u201d (first things) or even, in English translation, \u201cappetizers,\u201d but the popularity of the words \u201cantipasto\u201d and \u201cantipasti\u201d are more modern than ancient.<\/p>\n
In 1891, in the greatest Italian cookbook of its time, \u201cScience in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well,\u201d author Pellegrino Artusi states that the proper place or timing of foods such as \u201coysters, cured meats … or seafood such as anchovies or sardines\u201d was, in fact, \u201cafter the pasta course.\u201d He said this because he was a Tuscan where antipasti, in a twist on the word, were \u201cpost-pasta,\u201d eaten after the rice or pasta course but before the meat or fish course.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s the point of all this eating etymology anyway? Haven\u2019t cultures always munched the wee bits in order to stimulate their larger appetites? No, they haven\u2019t.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s because of what true antipasti are, characterized by an abundance of salt (such as in cheeses, pickles, brined olives), souring agents such as vinegars or citrus juices (pickles again, marinated vegetables) and both smoked fish and meat and cured meats, a.k.a. dried sausages.<\/p>\n
Looked at over a very long history, these foods are relatively new to the human palate, surprisingly so.<\/p>\n
The elements of salt, acid and smoke are preservatives. Peoples of the West did not salt, hang for curing, acidulate, smoke in order to cure, pickle or perform other preserving acts on food until beginning to do so some 3,000 years ago, mostly by desiccating foods such as fruits of their potentially spoiling moisture.<\/p>\n
Then, they rolled out food preservation practices slowly over millennia. For example, Roman sausage recipes don\u2019t appear until around 300 A.D.; uses of vinegaring agents really took hold in the Middle Ages, during the 10th to the 15th centuries.<\/p>\n
But note how these elements of salt, acid, smoke and their concentration (such as curing meats or making \u201cconserves,\u201d a notable word in this context) also majorly stimulate the palate. You can feel your saliva oozing onto your palate just reading their terms. No wonder that appetizer platters, in Italy and beyond, offer a bounty of such foods.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a pretty magical combination that history gave antipasti, isn\u2019t it, to have the development of methods of preservation so tied up with these many stimulants to the appetite?<\/p>\n
And, I think, the big reason that antipasti are \u201cbefore the meal\u201d is pretty much because they just give a great break to the cook. You\u2019ve got all these preserved foods around, hanging or jarred in your cellar or canned on your pantry shelf. Why not just platter up a bunch of them in front of your guests so that they might have at it before enjoying all your hard work at the main event?<\/p>\n
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Serves 8-12.<\/p>\n
Ingredients<\/strong><\/p>\n\n