“Picnic As…”

Even now I’m in two minds: is “picnic” really the right word here? Do I really wish to conjure up bucolic images of gallivanting about the countryside, all wicker baskets and gingham blankets, pink-stained fingers pinching the wet tops of strawberries, a knocked-over glass of bubbly fizzing over a clump of summer daisies?

The traditional British picnic has its roots in French pre-Revolution aristocracy. But when the posh pique-nique-ers feared for their heads, rather than lose a requisite piece of anatomy for a spot of outdoor munching, off they sailed for Blighty instead. And before you could say ‘rillettes de lapin à l’ancienne’, the craze was sweeping Georgian high society.

Picnics were then social affairs, events to see and be seen in. Their settings of countryside meadow or urban pleasure garden immersed the wealthy and privileged in a rural idyll, an escape from the bustle and grime of the city, bestowing them with an air of salubrity and restoration.

Nowadays, picnics are more democratic, but the word itself – if not the act of taking food outdoors – still seems entrenched in a genteel world of supermarket dips, served with a dash of whimsy and a sprinkling of kitsch.

This is not the kind of experience I’m trying to capture here. Instead I’m looking for other things, other meanings – tracing memories of outdoor eating that hold a particular significance for me, by what they convey or represent, from moments of collective celebration to those of quiet solitude.

Picnic As… A Place to Eat Matzo

I never grew up with picnics. It just wasn’t what my family did. The nearest we got was the annual ‘matzo ramble’ – a Passover tradition comprising a countryside walk with a snack of matzo crackers, as per the dietary customs of the festival.

It’s a ritual with no religious basis whatsoever. Arguably the opposite in fact – the Israelites were hunkering down in their desert bunkers to evade the solemn passage of the Angel of Death, an event that could hardly have engendered an urge to picnic.

I suspect its origins derive from the growing need – after several days of pretty much nothing but matzo – to relieve the monotony by at least changing-up where it is eaten.

So once a year, my parents would gather up my sister and me and a clutch of matzo sandwiches, and schlep us up and over the Pennines, through an inevitable misty drizzle – little shards of cracker falling on damp grass – and then march us back home again.

Not the most inspiring introduction to outdoor eating, it has to be said. But then one day, my perspective on picnics completely changed…

Picnic As… An Epiphany

Having tried to distance myself from picnics as the bucolic idyll, I’m now going to package you off to the timeless rolling hills of rural Tuscany. A little contradictory maybe, but after all those soggy matzo sandwiches, forgive me for this little piece of indulgent picnic recalibration.

To be fair, it was hardly The Grand Tour. I was 21 years old on a backpacking trip around Tuscany and Umbria, and it was done on such a shoestring that, for part of it, I ended up sleeping in a convent. (Well, a hostel within a convent anyway.)

The trip didn’t start that auspiciously either. By the second day I found myself clammy, restless, and irritable: my thoughts racing round and round like a disc of pizza dough being endlessly twirled about in the air. It was only after another breakfast that the culprit finally dawned on me… cappuccino.

And just a cup a day at that – we’re not talking Trainspotting here. Relieved to know at least I wasn’t losing my mind (I was genuinely worried at the time!), if slightly embarrassed at being such a caffeine lightweight, I felt quite bereft at having to forgo this slice of La Dolce Vita.

Seeking inspiration elsewhere, I instead popped into the local forno, and picked up a still-warm crusty loaf. And then to the deli next door, where I bought some local tomatoes ripe-to-bursting, plus a few sprigs of basil, a fat ball of mozzarella, and a cheap-ish bottle of Chianti.

Stuffing my haul into my backpack, I then made my way out of town: its impossibly-narrow streets soon far in the distance, and up ahead, nothing but a verdant patchwork of upright cypresses and reclining vines.

I found a little spot just off the road, and besides grapes and hills and sunshine, I sat myself down and proceeded to get my picnic out.

I think this was when I truly fell in love with food.

Picnic As… Generosity To A Stranger

Sometimes though, it’s not about the food itself but the sharing of it. And the thing with picnics is that there are no walls or doors to contain them. As their space is wholly contiguous with the rest of the universe, they can exert a gravitational field over all those who find themselves within their orbit.

Okay, so namely wasps.

But not always wasps. There was one occasion when I found myself as the unexpected visitor, and not in a waspy being-a-nuisance sort of way (or at least I hope not!).

It came on my medical student placement in Vava’u, in the South Pacific archipelago of Tonga. Whilst negotiating its single track roads by moped, I abruptly came across a large gathering amidst the bush.

It turned out to be a wedding feast. Rolled out in the sunny clearing were parallel reams of pandanus mats, with guests perching cross-legged on either side. In between were stacked mounds of typical Tongan fare: fried fish, raw fish, fish balls, coleslaw, sweet potato, pumpkin, papaya, watermelon, and jugs of ubiquitous orange soda.

I slowed down, and before I knew it, the guests, and then the bride and groom, eagerly beckoned me to join them. Immediately a plate was thrust into my hand, onto which a succession of guests enthusiastically came up and spooned an assortment of foods.

Then followed the traditional gift exchange of tapa cloth, before a set routine of dances, music, and speeches – including a sermon by a preacher who seemed rather furious, but went down a hit anyway, as everyone cheered and whooped.

Not wishing to overstay my welcome, I gratefully thanked the happy couple for such abundant hospitality, and bade everyone farewell. This curiously prompted an excitable ripple through the crowd, and then a sudden chorus of agreement. It was settled – the wedding party decided that it’d be totally remiss of them to let this foreigner leave without… a whole roast suckling pig.

Of course I tried to politely decline such a generous gift, but before I knew it, the party had descended on my moped, and following earnest discussions around logistics and some scratching of heads, and before I could wonder whether this might violate the terms of the rental agreement, they found a way of strapping the hulking carcass onto the bike’s rear frame.

And off I rode into the distance, genuinely humbled, a little unbalanced, and only slightly wondering what this Jewish boy was going to do with a whole suckling pig…

Picnic As… A Reunion in a Pandemic

Bringing us into more contemporary times, and whether from legal lockdowns or people’s own natural cautiousness around indoor gatherings, outdoor eating has taken on a whole new significance.

By the time the first summer of the pandemic was upon us, it had been nine months since I had seen my parents, sister and family. And although Zoom etc had brought a degree of connection and closeness, I still deeply missed seeing them in good old fashioned 3D.

So with restrictions partially easing, and my dad’s 70th birthday approaching, we decided on a family picnic – both a celebration and a reunion.

From various angles we all made our way to the West Midlands, converging on a random patch of grass roughly halfway between London and Manchester. Bright sunshine shone from a flawless blue sky on Charlecote Park, and standing by the front gate, buzzing with nine months of absence and anticipation, were my parents.

From afar, we waved, and they waved back; like a ship coming into harbour, it was a homecoming of sorts. Then the looks of surprise as they caught sight of our boys. “My, how they’ve grown!..” – for once, a justified refrain: my eldest now towered over my mum. Such is time in the era of pandemic.

Under a large shady oak and beside a meandering stream, we proceeded to roll out a blanket; my parents unfolded a pair of portable canvas chairs. Our boys played with their cousins – rambling over logs, and spirited games of hide-and-seek.

As for the food, well the least surprising element was that all three households had brought an obligatory tub of Sabra houmous, de rigeur for any a British Jewish picnic. Plus the usual packs of hand-cut crisps, carrot sticks, and cherry tomatoes that unerringly roll off the rug.

But then, something unexpected – for out of an unassuming little tupperware box, came a stack of homemade Anzac biscuits. Homemade… by dad!

This was quite startling: up till now, dad’s only relationship with the kitchen was generally confined to a swift tilt of the kettle and a dunk of a tea-bag. But somehow the pandemic – this catastrophe that had turned the world completely upside down – had also transformed dad into an accomplished baker.

And it didn’t stop there. As the months wore on, subsequent picnics, not to mention our family WhatsApp group, began to brim with ever more sumptuous bakery – from tahini swirls to chocolate cake, Rocky Road to Chelsea Buns.

A testament perhaps that you can always discover new passions, always scope for transformation, and maybe it’s the challenging times that bring this out the most.

Picnic As… A Londoner

Challenging times have certainly descended on London’s food and hospitality scene. Against this backdrop however, some forms of food business have managed to survive, whether through adaptation, graft, ingenuity, or just by maintaining an intrinsic and valued presence within their respective communities.

From corner shops to takeaways, delicatessens and bakeries – many from the city’s various diaspora communities – these stalwart enterprises offer good food to be enjoyed, if not always on site, then at home or outdoors. Such places have been a blessing, not least for me as I’ve been quite tentative about indoor gatherings (in part due to a health condition), even as pandemic restrictions ease.

They’ve also given me more impetus to visit corners of the city I’ve rarely been to before. And after all those long periods of confinement at home, when it comes to eating out, I find myself relishing the ‘out’ part almost as much as the eating.

Sometimes a particular combination of food x outdoor space feels more than the sum of its (already esteemable) parts. Take Kapihan for instance – a coffee house specialising in Filipino bakery. Its cabinet has such an inviting array of sweet and savoury buns, that it’s hard not to order at least two or three (okay, four.. well, five) and then trying to make for a inconspicuous exit (they’re for my family!.. ahem, cough).

Once outside though, I would suggest turning left, then walk straight through Battersea Park’s Albert Gate; shortly after, slink off to the right, where tucked behind a blue conifer is a cast-iron door. Open it and you’ll find yourself through the proverbial rabbit-hole, and into the floral wonderland that is the Old English Garden.

A century-old, but more recently reinvigorated through the nurturing hands of Thrive – a project that uses horticultural therapy to help people with various needs – the garden is a free public space that’s both majestic and egalitarian.

Sheltering this secret garden from the strains of the outside world is a vine-clad wall and a ring of towering trees. At its centre is a lily-lined ornamental pond, over which a fountain gently babbles. All around is a mosaic of colour, shape and form: flowers that mingle with kaleidoscopic greens, dappled with flashes of dragonfly turquoise and butterfly gold.

It’s a perfect spot in which to enjoy your haul of treats, whose own forms and colours seem to mirror the surrounding botanical marvels. A pan de coco comes as an emerald disc with rounded fronds – like an inverted version of one of the garden’s waterlilies – flavoured with pandan and filled with creamed macapuno coconut. A pillowy pandesal bun contains a fractal swirl of shiitake mushrooms, chilli oil, and three types of cheese. A sweeter version is puffed up like a toad, and filled with hazelnut paste and chocolate from the Filipino region of South Cotabato – perfect for dunking into a cup of smoky, fruity, bakaro coffee.

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Another public walled garden, equally serene, if a little more austere, is St Giles churchyard in Camberwell. Dotted with discrete varieties of shady trees, and with tombs peeking through the shrubbery, it’s a peaceful spot to make a picnic from one of the many, diverse, food outlets close by.

One such place is the Turkish ocakbasi, FM Mangal, where it’s worth catching the bossman at work behind the coals first, as he deftly brushes the flatbread with red pepper paste, sprinkles over some sumac and salt, turns the bread over the barbecuing meat for a brief dalliance, and then flips it back over the hot coals to catch the smoke. This is all done whilst also seamlessly rotating a medley of other meat skewers, as though playing an elaborate game of table football.

After the cooking, the wrapping – the juicy morsels of meat are tightly packaged in a weighty bundle alongside a handful of shredded red cabbage and lettuce, plus a generous drizzling of chilli and garlic sauces.

Whichever way you then tackle this behemoth, the laws of physics dictate that elements move from high pressure to low pressure, so expect the sauces to ooze out, and a seemingly never-ending battle to mop them up with your mouth before they drip onto the grass.

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Including takeaways in such a way may incur the wrath of picnic purists. But I’m of the view that picnics are broad and inclusive affairs that can encompass all sorts of things, as long as it involves taking good food and enjoying it outdoors.

And London – with its immense diversity of cuisines, and countless corners and parks in which to savour them – is arguably the perfect picnic city. Now if only the weather…

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What are your most memorable moments of outdoor eating? – I’d love to hear! And also any favourite picnic spots too. For more on ‘The Great British Picnic’, do catch this excellent episode of BBC Radio 4’s The Food Programme, hosted by Jaega Wise. Meanwhile, for more on Camberwell’s food scene, check out this fabulous guide by Jonathan Nunn in Eater London. Finally, as a bit of a counterpoint, here’s my piece on the history of the kitchen, the point at which humankind moved from eating outdoors to under a roof.

KAPIHAN X THE OLD ENGLISH GARDEN, BATTERSEA PARK

FM Mangal x St Giles Churchyard