Picnic deliciousness
June 22, 2010 4:18 AM

What can I make/bake for a picnic on Saturday?

I am going to a friend's birthday picnic this Saturday and have been asked to take along a delicious homemade dish. My standard response to this would be to bake a couple of batches of cupcakes, but this time I would like to do something savoury. I would like it to be something picnic-y (i.e. something easy to eat with ones fingers) but at the same time I would like it to stand out from the crowd as something a bit different.

Any ideas?
posted by jonnyploy to Food & Drink (11 answers total) 9 users marked this as a favorite
Something like this? You could turn it into mini-tarts with cherry tomatoes, change flavourings, use pre-made all-butter pastry, etc. It's not horribly original but this sort of item is tasty and just the thing to eat outside in the sun.

This tart is my usual contribution to picnics and is absolutely delicious especially if one adds a layer of mushrooms cooked with thyme and cognac and an array of summer vegetables. However it might be harder to turn into finger food.
posted by tavegyl at 4:29 AM on June 22, 2010


Cheesy garlic biscuit/scones? These are served at a popular seafood chain here in the US and they are delicious.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 4:42 AM on June 22, 2010


I like olive bread for this purpose. You can bake it in a muffin mold for individual servings, or slice it before arriving.

Ingredients:
Half a glass of lukewarm water (between 68-85F, not higher)
Active dry yeast, 1 tablespoon
Sugar, 1 tablespoon
Flour, 1lb
Olives, 3/4lb (with pits) or 1/2lb (without pits)
Salt, 1 tablespoon
Good tasting olive oil, 1/2 cup
2 onions
1 bunch of fresh cilantro, or 5 tablespoons of dried cilantro

Mix the lukewarm water, yeast, and sugar in a cup and leave to rise.

Remove the pits off the olives. Then chop the olives to make them a bit smaller. Don't worry about getting them all uniformly sized.

Mix the flour, olives, onions (diced), cilantro (diced), olive oil, and salt in a big bowl. Add the yeast, and mix well. Then, add droplets of lukewarm water as necessary, as you knead the dough to a somewhat soft "earlobe" consistency.

Cover the dough and leave it to rise in a warm place for about an hour.

Bake at 400F for approximately 1.5hrs. There isn't really need to pre-heat. It's done when a serrated knife inserted to the middle comes out clean. If you pour the dough into muffin molds, the bake time will be shorter, of course.
posted by copperbleu at 5:02 AM on June 22, 2010


I made these crabmeat devilled eggs for a bbq last week, and people loved them! Easy to make in large portions.
posted by still at 5:28 AM on June 22, 2010


Not terribly original, but delicious!

Curried Chicken Wraps

posted by Fairchild at 5:39 AM on June 22, 2010


Cheese straws!!
posted by oh really at 6:44 AM on June 22, 2010


Gougeres?
posted by thejanna at 6:45 AM on June 22, 2010


Tomato and Corn Pie. I have made this several times now, and it is a huge hit. For a potluck I followed the instructions at the bottom about making a "slab pie". That was by far my favorite, and the easiest to serve to a lot of people.
posted by purpletangerine at 7:45 AM on June 22, 2010


Mini Quiches!
posted by valoius at 7:58 AM on June 22, 2010


All of these look delicious, thanks very much everyone!

I will be going with ArgentCorvid's suggestion of cheesy garlic biscuits for this Saturday. Hopefully I will get the opportunity to try out all the other ideas soon too.
posted by jonnyploy at 1:23 AM on June 23, 2010


Savory Bao!

I just made some sweet (red bean or Dou Sha Bao) and thought about how awesome they would be for a picnic. The dough is simple, and if you (and the people you're feeding) don't mind having a non-purebread pedigree you can fill them with just about anything. (think leftover stew) They're great cold or room temp too.

LA Times has a step by step photo gallery. Just Hungry is a great blog with dough and traditional pork roast filling recipe. That blog also shows you how to make these into bunny shapes.

If the pork roast filling would be a bit more involved than you'd like, I'd think any combination of meat and flavorful veggies would be great.
posted by fontophilic at 7:27 AM on June 23, 2010


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