vermicelli recipes

VERMICELLI WITH OLIVE-OIL, OLIVES, CAPERS, AND ANCHOVIES

Take one-half pound of vermicelli and cover it well with salted water. Cook for about ten minutes. While it is boiling put into a saucepan four tablespoons of olive-oil, three anchovies cut up fine with six olives (ripe ones preferable) and one-half tablespoon of capers. When these are fried add the vermicelli (well drained), mix well, and put the saucepan at the back of the stove. Turn the vermicelli over with a fork every few minutes until it is thoroughly cooked.

VERMICELLI WITH FISH

Boil one-half pound of vermicelli in salted water, drain, and mix with two tablespoons of olive-oil and a little chopped-up parsley. Then set to one side to get cool.

Take five smelts, split them, take out the bones, and fry them slightly in one teaspoon of olive-oil.

Butter a pan and sprinkle it with bread crumbs. Then put into it one-half of the cold vermicelli. Pour over this some thick tomato sauce (one tablespoon of tomato paste cooked in two tablespoons of olive-oil). Then put in the smelts cut in two, some anchovy, a few capers, and three or four ripe olives chopped up with one mushroom. Then add the rest of the tomato sauce, then the other half of the vermicelli, and on top a layer of bread crumbs. Season all well with salt and pepper. Put the pan into a moderate oven, and cook about an hour and a quarter, adding a little olive-oil when necessary, so that it will not dry up too much.

Any fish may be used instead of the smelts, cutting it into thin strips.

TIMBALE OF VERMICELLI WITH TOMATOES (Neapolitan Receipt)

Take ten medium-sized fresh tomatoes and cut them in two crosswise. Put a layer of these into a baking-dish with the liquid side touching the bottom of the dish. Now put another layer with the liquid side up, sprinkle on salt and pepper. Break the raw vermicelli the length of the baking-dish and put a layer of it on top of the tomatoes. Now add another layer of the tomatoes, with the skin side touching the vermicelli, a second layer with the liquid side up, salt and pepper, and another layer of the raw vermicelli, and so on, the top layer being of tomatoes with their liquid side touching the vermicelli. Heat three or four tablespoons of good lard (or butter), and when the lard boils pour it over the tomatoes and vermicelli; then put the dish into the oven and cook until the vermicelli is thoroughly done. After cooling a little while, turn it out into a platter.