Park Picnics

19 May

Park picnics are amongst some of my favourite meals. We live in a city and being as my three kids all seem to have truly remarkable social lives - cue all this summer sunshine - sometimes the best place to facilitate them meeting up with their friends (some of whom have parents who are also my friends), is the park around the corner from our house. These meals, enjoyed outside, have a faff free, spontaneous feel to them, and I love them for this.

We have a park picnic bag slung up in the garage, nothing luxurious, much more functional, I can’t ever see myself with a wicker hamper, so instead our picnic bag is one of those giant blue Ikea bags. Nevertheless, come the warmer weather, this bag hangs there, ready for action. In it always, is our ancient stripy picnic blanket. I have had this picnic blanket for over 25 years, my older brother brought it back from Mexico for me as a present one Christmas. This blanket has seen a lot of picnics, there have been many spillages. Blue, pink, black and white stripes in a coarse, thick cotton, this blanket is the back drop to so many years of picnics, photos of me in my student years, in my 20s, then there’s the arrival of babies in sunhats, shaded and lying on the blanket, crawling toddlers, now teenagers, all arms and legs. The blanket is an island of food and family, the edges littered with stray sandals, water guns, rounders bats, cricket bats, rugby balls and more.

Over the years, with this family fondness for eating outdoors well recognised, we have accumulated some pretty nifty outdoor dining gear. A stack of very pretty melanine plates and bowls, wine glasses that look like the real thing in your hand, only noticeably not when tapped. We have a Tupperware of ‘camping cutlery’, i.e. the slightly less good stuff, knives, forks and spoons, some chopsticks too. There is always a corkscrew, similarly, the freezer is never without freezer bricks.

With the scene set, thoughts turn to what to cook. Park picnics, in my world, and with my family, are an extra sociable event; friends are invited, blankets nudge up next to each other, a table on the floor, people congregate, the crowd swells, there will always be more people than first anticipated, and this is fine, because everyone brings a dish.

These 6 recipes are perfect for a park picnic, make one, or two or more, depending on your park picnic numbers, they are all pretty quick to throw together, you can then tub them up and take them to the park, or do as I have been known to do, and stagger to the park, arms brimming with bowls of food, shoulders laden with my enormous ikea bag, blanket, cricket bat, bowl etc etc.

As for pudding, somewhere in the distance, an ice cream van pulls up.

I am sharing these recipes at www.5oclockapron.com because I love sharing with this audience how I cook at home. And whilst I also have 10 published cookery books, I’d like for as many people as possible to have access to my recipes. There’s also my reels over on instagram where I post cookery videos which dovetail with all the recipes on my website and in my cookbooks.

I love cooking, and I love writing about food. @5oclockapron, in a nutshell!