Picnic perfection

I love picnic food, but the best venue is your own back garden, writes DOMINI KEMP.

IT’S EASY WHEN you look at outdoorsy, lifestyle cookery books and magazine shoots to think how dreary and grey our lives seem in comparison. I walk along the beach in Sandymount, dodging litter, debris and animal extracts, while the waft of the sewage-treatment plant from across the bay lingers on the sea air. I think about cookery shows from the likes of Australia’s Bill Granger, and how sunny, bright and clean his Sydney world must look in comparison.

Now don’t get me wrong: I love the idea of picnic food, but more often than not, a real-life picnic seems far too tricky to organise.

While on a week’s holliers recently, we camped out on a quiet beach for a day, and because there were no artisan food-markets or cutesy delis around, we ventured into a pretty average supermarket.

We bought a big bottle of water, a loaf of bread, a packet of cheese and some dodgy cured meat that was hot and sweaty after sitting in the sun for a few hours. A few pieces of over-ripe fruit completed the picture.

It was a rather pathetic offering in terms of haute cuisine, but hit the spot perfectly, the reason being that the sun was shining and it filled our bellies with no fuss.

When I think of picnic foods, I think of stuff that I’d rather eat in my back garden than have to pack up and traipse off with to the local sea-front or park. For some reason, the idea of eating ornate, fancy picnic fare does not work when you walk along my local sea-front.

Maybe I’m just an old grouch, but if I’m going to make a savoury tart or summer dessert, I’d like to eat it in the garden at home.

I’ll keep the crisps, ice creams and cans of lager for the strand.

Pork souvlaki tart

Makes four generous tarts. If you don’t want the hassle of making the tart bases, just use pitta bread.

Tart bases

1 tbsp olive oil

3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

1 red onion, peeled and chopped

225g butter

280g flour

1 pack of cream cheese (approximately 200g)

Topping

1-2 pork fillets (1 kg of meat in total)

1 red onion, peeled and chopped

1 tsp salt

pepper

1 tsp chopped oregano

Juice of 2 lemons

50ml olive oil

Garnish: Roasted red peppers, rocket, mixed leaves

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees/gas four. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan and sweat the garlic and onion until soft, then allow it to cool fully. In a food processor, mix the butter, flour and cream cheese until it forms a soft dough. Mix in the cold onion and garlic mixture. It may be too soft and greasy, but don’t worry about it. Wrap it up in cling-film and chill, overnight if possible.

Divide the dough into four, roll out on a floured surface until about one-centimetre thick and then place on a baking tray lined with baking paper and bake for 15-20 minutes until it is golden brown. Allow to cool on the trays, while you cook the pork.

Make sure the pork fillets are well trimmed of fat and chop into large, bite-sized chunks. You want to end up with 800-900g of chopped pork fillet. Marinate the pork with all the ingredients, overnight if possible, and then cook on the barbecue or under a hot grill until brown and charred and cooked through. Put the tart bases on a plate and top with pork and roasted peppers and mixed leaves. You could mix a few spoons of Greek yoghurt with a clove of crushed garlic, chopped mint, salt, pepper and lemon juice and drizzle this on top.

Lime ice-cream with cajeta

Cajeta is a kind of Mexican caramel.

Grated zest and juice of three limes

150g granulated sugar

250ml cream

250ml tub crème fraïche

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp tequila or rum

Mix all the ingredients together and freeze in a shallow tray or plastic container. Wrap it well with cling film and it should freeze in four to six hours, or overnight.

Cajeta

2 litres goats’ milk

200g granulated sugar

Piece of cinnamon

½ tsp bicarbonate of soda

Heat the goats’ milk, sugar and cinnamon stick until simmering and cook for 10 minutes. Mix the bicarbonate of soda with a tablespoon of lukewarm water. Take the saucepan off the heat and carefully add the bicarbonate water to the goats’ milk mixture (it can bubble up, so be careful). Whisk and then gently simmer for two to three hours, until it is thick and golden brown. If it starts to burn, you might have to transfer it to a non-stick saucepan, and keep reducing down. Mine eventually went a bit lumpy, so I added a few tablespoons of warm water, whisked away the lumps, put it through a sieve and continued to cook down until I got the flavour and consistency right. Drizzle onto the ice-cream and serve. dkemp@irishtimes.com.

See also www.itsa.ie.