Preparation

• Prepare the lentils following the procedure described in cooking lentils | basic recipe or, if you already have them ready in the freezer, defrost them.

  Alternatively, you can use packaged pre-cooked lentils.
  Remember to rinse them well under running water: canned legumes often contain additives, salt, and sometimes sugar.
  Among the types of packaging, glass containers are preferable to tin containers as they are less subject to spoilage.

  

• Given the variety of dishes that characterize the New Year’s Eve dinner table, it is preferable to limit oneself to a taste, hence mini portions or finger food.

  Unless lentils and cotechino [casing: gut] or lentils and zampone [casing: front pig leg] are a course in your festive menu.

• You can serve lentils hot, warm or cold.

• When to serve lentils on New Year’s Eve?
  Before or after midnight?

  There are different schools of thought.

  I suggest:
  – before midnight if lentils together with cotechino or zampone are a course in the festive menu;
  – after midnight if lentils are a taste of good fortune for the upcoming year; in this case, mini portions or finger foods suffice.

• Place lentils in the center of the table at the disposal of the guests, for example, in a small saucepan or a small pan.

  

• You can serve lentils in themed small bowls or plates.

  

• You can serve lentils in themed or assorted small cups.

• You can serve lentils in glass or finger food glasses on a base of creamy vegetable soup, for example light broccoli cream and light pumpkin cream.

  You can serve lentils inside a large and easy-to-fill format of dried pasta, such as conchiglioni or lumaconi, cooked very al dente.

  You can serve lentils inside light puff pastry vol-au-vent.

  You can serve lentils in scallop shells.

• – Light lentil cream.