JULIE AND SHELLEY'S ANTIPASTI

Several years ago my friend Shelley and I ate a wonderful antipasti. We have been looking and looking for that recipe. Finally Shelley found one in an old cookbook from the Children's Hospital in Seattle. It looked right. We spent a day shopping, cutting, boiling, steaming and, of course, chatting. In the end we had almost exactly the same wonderful antipasti we remembered. We have happily shared our jars with many of you and in answer to your requests, here are the instructions for making it.

SHOPPING LIST

Most of these ingredients are easy to find. If you have a problem locating them or don't understand my directions, email me, or better yet, just come over and we'll cook together!

2 lbs (1k) cauliflower

1 lb (500gr) small carrots

2 lbs (1k) mushrooms

2 lbs (1k) small green beans

2 lbs (1k) green peppers (capsicums)

1 lb (500g) mix of red and yellow peppers (capsicums)

2 lbs (1k) small whole onions

2 lbs (1k) mix of pitted ripe olives (black) and stuffed green olives.

2 lbs (1k) dill pickles

1/2 lb (250g) canned anchovy fillets packed in oil

28 oz (800g) canned tuna packed in oil

2 cans of artichoke hearts

56 oz (1600g) Heinz catsup

1 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar

1 1/2 cups olive oil

PREPARING THE ANTIPASTI

As you cut or break the vegetables remember that the pieces have to be small enough to stay on a cracker, but big enough that they don't cook too much and become soft.

Break the cauliflower into pieces. Drop the pieces into a pot of boiling water and cook for 3 minutes. Remove them from the boiling water and rinse with a little cold water to stop the cooking. This is called parboiling. For all the vegetables that need to be parboiled, you can use the same boiling water, but do the onions last.

Peel the carrots and cut them into chunks; parboil them for 2 minutes.

Cut the green beans into pieces and parboil them for 2 minutes.

Parboil the onions for 6 minutes. It will be easier to take the skins off of them after they are boiled. Then cut them into pieces if they seem too large for your cracker.

Remove the pith and seeds from the green pepper and cut into short strips.

Slice the mushrooms and sauté them in a little olive oil until they are tender.

*** DON'T GIVE UP! KEEP WORKING! YOU ARE OVER HALF WAY ***

Cut the red and yellow peppers in half and remove the pith and seeds. Then flatten them with your hand. Put them under a hot, preheated broiler, skin side up until the skins are black. Seal them in a paper bag for 10 minutes. Peel off the blackened skin and slice the roasted peppers into strips. You can also blacken them by holding them over a flame with a fork. If you want to save time and work, you can buy a 1 lb (500g) jar of pimentos. Drain them and cut them into strips.

Sometimes the olives are very big and need to be cut in half. Or even quarters!

Open the anchovy and tuna cans, but DON'T drain the oil off.

Cut the artichoke hearts into quarters.

Okay! Got everything together in one place?

Pour the catsup, vinegar and olive oil into a big pot. Bring them to a boil, reduce the heat, and cook it gently (simmer) for 10 minutes. Add the cauliflower, carrots, beans, green peppers and roasted red and yellow peppers (or pimentos). Simmer this for 10 minutes. Add the onions, olives and dill pickles. Simmer for 5 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients including the oil from the anchovies and the tuna. Cook everything for 14 minutes. You will need to stir the pot occasionally to make sure everything gets well mixed and evenly heated.

If you have MANY hungry friends and LOTS of crackers, you can eat it all now, or put some in the refrigerator for as long as two weeks. If you want to keep it longer, you need to seal it in jars.

CANNING NOTES

You will need 20 - 22 pint (1/2 liter) jars that have special two part lids. One part is a flat metal disk that sits on the top of the jar and the other part is a metal ring that screws on to close the top. The jars and lids must be washed in very hot soapy water. Usually a dishwasher is hot enough. Then cover the flat disks with boiling water until you are ready to use them.

You also need a big pot of boiling water. The pot must be big enough to hold a few jars without touching each other. You can buy a special canning kettle or use something you have. It must be deep enough to cover the jars with 1" (2.5cm) of water. You also need something to keep the jars off the bottom. A small round cake rack, or steamer rack works well. There are several sites on the web that provide information about canning. One that has photos of the equipment is: http://lesleycooks.tripod.com/canning/canningtips.htm

When the jars are clean, the big pot of water is boiling, and the pot of antipasti is cooked, you are ready to start canning.

BE CAREFUL! Sometimes other people like to join you now and pretend they have been helping the whole time!

Fill the hot jars, leaving about 1/2 inch (12mm) empty at the top. Wipe the top of the jar very well. Place one of the flat metal disk lids on the top, then screw on a metal ring lid. Don’t make the ring too tight, because the air in the jar must be able to escape. Using tongs, lower the jar into the boiling water.

Add more jars to the water. Boil all the jars for 20 minutes. Take them out and set them on a towel to cool. Add more jars to the boiling water, and keep going until all of them are done.

DONE! This antipasti is best when shared with family and friends!