Summer Picnic Club 3

ntertainment under the stars! I read a blurb in Sunset magazine and decided to coincide the third installation of Summer Picnic Club with the Outdoor Cinema Food Fest's screening of The Hangover at Exposition Park.

As you can see, a lot of people came out!  And they came totally prepared with blankets, picnic baskets, coolers, lawn chairs -- even books, board games, and booze, for the ide hours of daylight before the movie started.

[movie-watching picnickers]

For those who were less prepared more spontaneous, there was a long line of catering trucks, serving everything from your typical hot dog + chili fries, to more exotic things like Indian wraps and curries and sushi.  The lines were long!

[catering trucks]

DC and I had forgotten to bring a picnic blanket, so we sat on our eco bags, which worked out fine.  The Hangover is a terrific film to watch on a huge screen with a bunch of strangers.  It's just as hilarious the second time!

The Outdoor Cinema Food Fest has a couple more events this summer, if you're interested.  Check out their website here for movie names, dates, and venues.

Summer Picnic Club 1

The first Summer Picnic Club outing happened last Saturday!  My parents arrived early and snagged a sweet spot in the shade; some friends came out with fruit salad and even mimosas (hush hush)!  It was an idyllic afternoon to be outdoors; as you can see, many other people decided to go to the park, too.  We watched a swing-dancing group practice their moves (with lifts!), a high school reunion, people walking their dogs, parents and siblings practicing baseball swings and ball tosses, and a troupe of children with a bubble maker.  I want one of those!

[dad + squirrel]

I've posted enough pictures of picnic spreads so will leave you of this shot of my dad, taking a picture of a squirrel.  I don't know if you can see it, but the squirrel is holding a cherry that my dad had given it.  Very funny.

The next installation is in three weeks; hope to see more people and explore more outdoors spaces!

Summer Picnic Club preview

Summer picnicking got started a bit early thanks to a lovely weekend spent wine tasting in the Santa Ynez Valley.  We had a glorious spread of bread, cheese, salami, turkey, carrots, cherries, watermelon, and a refreshing Sauvignon Blanc.  The weather was perfect.

[picnic]

The Santa Ynez Valley is such an easy and feasible getaway, especially with very action-oriented friends (we casually talked about the possibility of going just a few weeks ago).  And probably on account of the film.  We got seated at "the Sideways table" at the Hitching Post.

[towards the wine tasting]

Later, we even made a stop in Solvang and went to Sunday Service at Mission Santa Ines.  Hope you had a good Memorial Day weekend; we sure did!

Summer Picnic Club 2010!

Ever since I read this post, and a week or so later, this one (look at that amazing photo!), I have had summer picnics on the brain.  Good food + outdoors + friends, old and new = totally enamored.

And so I took to the Internets to research.  Of course.  I had to start with finding the origins of the picnic.  Wikipedia's definition is longer, but here's a shorter one that I liked:

The word picnic traces to the 1692 edition of a French book, where it was used to describe a group of people dining in a restaurant who brought their own wine. For a long time a picnic meant a meal that everyone contributed something to, similar to a potluck. Sometime during the Middle Ages, picnics became the enjoyable outdoor meals that we know of today. In the early 19th century in London, the Picnic Society was formed by a group of fashionable people for purposes of entertainment.

Then I looked into what others have done, and how.  The Tokyo Picnic Club was a great find -- but maybe that's because I have a slight bent towards Japanese aesthetics. (^o^)  I plan on incorporating their 15 rules into my own iteration. 

And, keeping rules 7, 8, and 9 in mind, what's a picnic without food?  Martha and The Kitchn have been my go-to's, from how to plan a picnic to picnic knives to picnic recipes.   Pressed sandwiches, anyone?  See Heart of Light's version here.  Or how about a salad in a jar?  Lots of new recipes to try out -- good practice for packing work lunches, too!

I've got dates and at least the first location in mind but am still overthinking the wording -- ironic especially because I want this to be an easy project -- and hope to get my invitations out to friends by early June.  That's next week.  Geez.

Summer Picnic Club 2010 is all I think about whenever I pass by a park, particulary these days, as they are verdant and abloom.  I have talked it all up among some close friends, and DC is totally on board.  So at the very least, there will be a few people -- I hope!  Onwards with the planning!