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Life's a Picnic

I don't manage to go on nearly enough picnics. It's a shame, really, because I live near several beautiful beaches, a wonderful park, and breathtaking mountains and islands. I suppose our short summer is part of it - June is often wetter than hoped for on the west coast - and my summers are no longer the youthful, carefree two-month romp on the beach. I've got stuff to do, and precious little time to do it in. I fell away from the habit of picnicking, too. For a few years, a while back when I was ill, it simply wasn’t an option to be away from adequate plumbing for terribly long, and I somehow mentally crossed picnicking off of my list of things that I do. This summer (and possibly into autumn) I plan to make up for lost time. All it will take is making picnicking a priority.

For some people there are inarguable items to take on a picnic. These may include some sort of chicken, or potato salad, or grapes, but the options are almost unlimited for those intrepid enough to step outside the basic boxed lunch. Picnic foods should be at least a little bit celebratory; they occupy a very particular ground between the everyday school/work lunch, thrown together in a hurry, and the summer party, which may or may not involve use of a full kitchen and/or an outdoor grill. To be fair, you can picnic quite satisfactorily with a grill, as long as your picnic site supports the activity and you have a) the equipment and b) a way to transport it.

The best picnic, however, is eminently transportable. Whether you have a nifty basket, a cooler, a backpack with its own place settings, or a big cloth bag to lug your goodies in, you need to be able to get yourself and your food to your destination intact. If you’re traveling light – one or two people on foot – you are necessarily going to need to plan well, and make decisions about what to take based on your ability to keep things at an appropriate temperature as well as simple portability logistics.

While the traditional favourite of potato salad may be on the wane as people shy away from the potential problems surrounding mayonnaise and lack of refrigeration, there are plenty of alternative salads that can fill the niche quite happily. I am getting quite a reputation for my advocacy of lentil salads, but I must again insist upon them as both delicious and safe to cart about at room temperature. The mighty lentil salad, in fact, was something that I first discovered at a picnic. Back in the sunny days of university, there was one particularly sunny summer that renewed my fervour for picnics. Every Sunday afternoon, as soon as I got finished work at my second job (earning money for next year’s tuition), I would head off to Jericho Beach to meet up with a couple of  friends of mine and their crazy vegetarian friends. Every Sunday, it was an informal pot-luck vegetarian picnic where anyone could drop in. There were Frisbees to toss around, camping games, story-telling, fascinating conversations to participate in or listen to while collapsed happily in the sun, always new people to meet, and always new foods to try. To this day, I have no idea who brought the lentil salad or exactly what was in it, other than olive oil (I remember asking). I did learn that I wanted more, however, and eventually I learned how to make the good stuff myself.

I learned that my de facto picnic habits were not the only items I could put on the menu. I learned that looking to other cultures for foods that are delicious served room temperature or cold could open up an entirely untold vista of culinary opportunity. I discovered hummus. I learned that I never had to make a sandwich for a picnic again, but that if I did, it was going to be a muffaletta. I learned that pasta salad could be made from couscous or Japanese noodles, without the dreaded mayonnaise. I learned that some people like marinated tofu squares, but that I wasn’t one of them (not at the time, but I’m willing to be persuaded, if you’ve got a terrific one).

Years later, and with many a picnic under my belt, I got a glimpse of picnicking in other parts of the world. In Europe, to be precise. The first thing that struck me was how absolutely common it was for families to picnic quite casually and frequently, in whatever park or field happened to be handy. The second thing was that alcohol was permitted in parks, and the happy French families around me in the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont each had a bottle of wine to wash down their meals. Such a far cry, really, from the draconian liquor laws back home!  At one point, I rounded up a motley bunch of fellow travelers from a hostel and hit an open-air market to provision ourselves for a little al fresco dining of our own. One was sent off for baguettes, one for cheese, two for wine (the Italians, of course), one for fruit. Someone also picked up a box of pastries, which was a lovely surprise. As for me, I found a vendor turning roast chickens on a spit, so that’s what I bought.

We met up and headed off for the park, excitement in our step and bags of fresh food swaying from our hands as we hopped from metro to bus until we reached our destination. In our hasty planning, we neglected to make sure we had cups for the wine. We also neglected to ensure that there was a bottle opener, but one of the Italians was equipped with a suitable Swiss Army knife, so all was well. For cups, we simply begged a few from a nearby family of fellow picnickers, who had a supply of plastic cups with them and were happy to share. There, sitting on our coats in the splendid afternoon sun, drinking wine from a plastic cup and sharing wonderfully fresh food with a bunch of people I barely knew, I felt blissfully content.

June 2006