There’s no better time than early fall to sit around the backyard to talk a lot and eat just a little. Rather than cooking or grilling a three-course meal, serve a spread of little “bites.”

If you can toast bread, chop tomatoes and slice sausage, a small-bites feast is a breeze. Call it “antipasti,” “mezes” or “tapas” or just plain old appetizers, this spread is a great way to eat throughout the evenings of late September and into October. Plan a filling dish or two to serve as anchors — a rice salad or a frittata — then at the last minute assemble an assortment of accompaniments based on staples you have on hand, such as spiced almonds, bruschetta, home-finished olives, stuffed peppers and dried sausages. This menu can be elaborate enough to rival a small tapas bar.

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A bean spread is rich with anchovies and capers.

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Mel Melcon/Los Angeles Times

Lemon juice, red onion and tomato add summery flavors to a salad with shrimp finished with arugula and pine nuts.

Small bites

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To make a good assortment of small plates, stock up on high-quality pantry goods, grab fresh and seasonal ingredients and master a few basic techniques that can be adapted in a mix-and-match way.

With just toast, you’re halfway to bruschetta or crostini (hint: when you’re doing a bunch of toast, it’s easier to bake the bread slices in a 400-degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes). The light but sturdy texture of sourdough works best, but whether it comes from slicing a long, thin baguette or cutting pieces of a round boule is up to you. For toppings try marinated fresh cheeses, flavored spreads, chopped tomatoes or vegetables (raw or cooked), little bits of canned anchovies, sardines or tuna. The first step should always be to rub the hot, toasted bread with a cut piece of garlic and then to moisten it slightly with olive oil.

Spiced almonds are another almost-instant appetizer. The classic Spanish technique calls for deep-frying them in olive oil, which might make them too greasy. Instead, moisten a cup of raw almonds with a half teaspoon of good olive oil and stir-fry them in a dry skillet over medium-high heat until they begin to crackle and send up a toasty aroma. This will take only about two or three minutes. Remove them from the heat and sprinkle with salt.

They’re good just like that, but also try flavoring them with a little cumin or ground chile. Or toss the almonds with minced fresh sage, rosemary or thyme or all three.

Every refrigerator should contain a jar of home-finished olives. Take commercially cured black or green brined olives, give them a good rinse and pat them dry. Season them, finishing with a healthy shot of good olive oil and lemon or orange juice or red wine vinegar.

This takes five minutes and makes even canned olives taste like a million bucks. They’ll last for months in the refrigerator; just let them reach room temperature before serving.

The simple technique of marinating adapts easily. Try marinating the olives with combinations of orange or lemon peel, sliced garlic and spices such as black pepper, cumin, fennel seed or red chiles, as well as fresh herbs such as bay leaves, rosemary, oregano or thyme.

Piquillo red peppers are another canned food that is handy to have in the pantry. They’re small enough to make perfect bite-size containers for fresh mozzarella or goat cheese or even canned tuna and mayonnaise. Arrange the stuffed peppers on a plate and garnish with a drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkling of minced garlic and parsley. Serve on toast or spear them with toothpicks so they’ll be easy to handle.

For the meal’s centerpiece, choose rice salads and frittatas, which have the heft of main courses but are light enough to serve as part of a small-bites dinner. Both are almost infinitely variable and can be made in advance and served at room temperature.

You can make a great frittata with shredded zucchini, sautéed onions and red bell peppers, asparagus or mushrooms — there are so many possibilities.

Rice salads are just as flexible but even easier to make. Here’s a trick: Cook the rice as if it were pasta, in plenty of rapidly boiling water. This way the grains won’t be coated in sticky starch and clump together; they’ll stay light and separate. Cook it a little longer than you might think, because the rice will firm up as it cools.

Dress the warm rice with oil and lemon juice or vinegar because once it cools, its waxy starch hardens and prevents the seasoning from penetrating the grains.

Rice salads can be baroque or simple, made with slivered prosciutto, diced salami, cooked vegetables, pieces of firm cheese, chopped tomatoes and fresh herbs — just about anything you can think of. To prevent wilting, fold in the raw ingredients right before serving. Taste for salt and vinegar and don’t be shy. Rice is slightly bland, so these salads should be highly seasoned.

Mound the salad in a bowl and surround it with small plates of almonds, sliced “salami,” olives, bruschetta and more. Make sure the ice bucket is full of chilled rosé, and put Sarah Vaughan and Astrud Gilberto on shuffle.