When the sun is out, we want to be out too and a picnic in the park sounds to us like a pretty good way to spend a Saturday or Sunday afternoon.
If you're planning some al fresco eating, these recipes from the nice people at Gail's are relatively easy to make at home and a darn sight better than a couple of sad sandwiches from the local shop.
There's a smoked salmon and spinach tart, a tasty picnic loaf, delicious sausage rolls and a tray bake for dessert – all easy to pack in the bag with your rug.
More info on Gail's bakeries and food here.
Smoked Salmon and Spinach Tart
Serves 10
A bit of a controversial ingredient, smoked salmon. You want sustainable, top-quality fish but good, environmentally friendly, wild salmon doesn’t come cheap, so it’s something of an occasional treat. If you do invest in some for a special occasion, this tart is a clever way to make it go a lot further. On another note, for the gluten-free brigade, the filling can be cooked in a baking tray lined with non-stick baking paper to make a crustless tart.
Ingredients
For the honey and mustard dressing
50g Dijon mustard
50g clear honey
5 sprigs of dill, finely chopped
For the tart
3 tbsp olive oil
400g onions, sliced
1 small garlic clove, crushed
1 bunch of spring onions, chopped
200g baby spinach, washed and drained, but not dried
1 large bunch of rocket
1 small bunch of dill, roughly chopped
200ml double cream
1/2 tsp white pepper
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
3 eggs, beaten
1 quantity flaky pastry
Flour, for dusting
300g smoked salmon
Instructions
Make the dressing by whisking together all the ingredients. Set to one side. Heat the olive oil in a pan over a medium heat. Fry the onions until translucent, stirring regularly – about 6–8 minutes – then add the crushed garlic. Cook for 2–3 minutes until the garlic is fragrant, but not coloured.
Add the spring onions and cook for 2 minutes until softened, then add the spinach (still damp from rinsing) and the rocket. Let them wilt and collapse in the pan before adding the dill and the cream. Simmer for 5 minutes until the mixture reduces and thickens slightly, then taste and season with white pepper, salt, nutmeg and mustard. Pour into a clean bowl and leave to cool, then chill. When the mixture is cold, mix the beaten eggs into the greens and set aside.
Meanwhile, lightly dust the worktop and rolling pin with flour and roll out the pastry to a rectangle roughly 30cm x 40cm. Use the pastry to line a baking dish about 25cm x 35cm, and 4cm deep. To transfer the pastry sheet easily to the dish, roll it around onto your rolling pin, position it at the end of the baking dish and unroll the dough into the dish. Press the pastry into the base up the sides to form a rough tart case, then chill for an hour in the fridge or 30 minutes in the freezer.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4 and put a baking sheet in the oven to heat up. Lay and fold the slices of smoked salmon in the chilled pastry case so that they don’t sit flat. Imagine slicing the tart, and make sure that everyone will get a fair portion of fish. Pour the prepared filling into the case, so that the folds of smoked salmon are still peaking above the liquid.
Place on the hot baking sheet and bake for 35–40 minutes until the base is golden brown. Leave to cool slightly, slice, and serve warm with the honey and mustard dressing drizzled over and a salad on the side.
VARIATIONS: Smoked salmon has a very strong flavour when baked, so if you want something slightly milder, try flakes of hot-smoked salmon. Smoked trout or mackerel are also good alternatives.
Blackberry and Apple Tray Bake
Serves 6–8
This is a dead easy tray bake. Served warm, it makes for the perfect autumn dessert, accompanied by cream, custard or thick yoghurt, plus extra fresh berries or compôte. Keep the fruit seasonal and mix it up to suit your taste – summer berries, peach and blueberry, rhubarb and strawberry, pear and stem ginger. If you find the fruit you choose has a tendency to sink to the bottom as the cake cooks, next time, toss it very lightly in flour and shake off any excess in a sieve or colander before stirring into the batter.
Ingredients
175g butter, plus extra for greasing
300g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
1 small Bramley apple, cored, peeled, quartered and thinly sliced
2 small red apples, cored and thinly sliced
2 tbsp lemon juice
300ml double cream
3 eggs
220g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
300g fresh blackberries
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 170°C/gas mark 3. Butter and flour a deep pudding dish about 20cm x 30cm. Toss the slices of apples in the lemon juice to prevent them from browning.
Pour the cream into a saucepan, add the butter, and place over a medium heat. Allow the butter to melt, stirring, but don’t let it come to the boil. Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly.
Beat the eggs with the sugar in a bowl until well combined, then pour on the warm cream mixture, stirring all the time. Fold in the flour with a large metal spoon, then stir through the berries and slices of apple. Pour everything into the baking dish. Bake for about 40 minutes, by which point it should be puffed up, lightly golden and very slightly crisp at the edges. A skewer pushed into the centre should come out clean – take care not to over-bake this or it will lose its lightness.
Sausage Rolls
Makes 14 rolls
We think these are the best sausage rolls on the planet, and few who try them disagree. They’re a bit fatter than the ones you’re likely to be familiar with – but that's a good thing.
Ingredients
500-600g flaky pastry
600g of sausage meat
Egg wash
2 tsp sesame seeds
2 tsp nigella seeds
Ketchup, to serve
Flour, for dusting
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas mark 6 and line a baking sheet with non-stick baking paper.
Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface to give a rectangle measuring 30cm x 40cm. Lay it in front of you so that the short sides are to your left and right. Cut it in half horizontally with a sharp knife, so that you have two 15cm x 40cm rectangles. (If at any point in the process the dough becomes too soft to handle, just put everything in the fridge for 20 minutes to firm up again.)
Cut the sausage meat in half. Shape each into a log the length of the pastry rectangles. Place one along the centre of one of the rectangles. Brush the top edge of the rectangle with egg wash, then fold up the bottom edge to cover the sausage, but not so that it meets the top edge. Roll the rectangle away from you so that the pastry wraps around itself slightly, sealing up along the egg-washed edge. Repeat with the second rectangle and the second sausage meat roll.
Cut each giant sausage roll into 7 equal pieces to give you 14 in total. Egg-wash their tops and sprinkle with a mixture of the seeds. Lay them on the baking sheet, well spaced out, and bake for 25–30 minutes, until the sausage is cooked right through and the pastry is dark golden and crisp. Serve as they should be – with ketchup.
Leek and Goat's Cheese Picnic Loaf
Serves 6
This is a slightly zany, totally delicious idea for a picnic dish that makes a great alternative to sandwiches. It turns a hollowed-out loaf into a bread bowl, which is then filled like a quiche with a rich custard and plenty of fillings. We used Gail's French Dark Sourdough. You can easily mix the fillings up – just don’t forget to pack a good serrated knife for cutting and serving.
Ingredients
1 round loaf of bread, 20–25cm in diameter – any kind
you like
1 garlic clove, halved
2 tsp Dijon mustard
4 leeks, finely sliced, dark leaves discarded
100ml olive oil
1/2 tsp salt, plus extra to taste
1/2 tsp black pepper, plus extra to taste
5 sprigs of thyme, leaves only, chopped
2 eggs
150ml double cream
250g soft, fresh goat’s cheese, crumbled
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4. Prepare the bread bowl. Slice across the loaf of bread to remove the upper third, then use your hands to pull out as much of the middle of the remaining loaf as you can, creating a crusty bowl. You won’t need this excavated bread for this recipe, so set it aside to make breadcrumbs.
Bake the bread bowl for 10 minutes, then, once it’s cool enough to handle, gently rub the cut sides of garlic around the inside of the loaf. Coat the inside with mustard – use the back of a spoon or, even better, a pastry brush, to help you spread it evenly. Set the hollowed-out loaf aside and increase the oven temperature to 200°C/gas mark 6.
To make the filling, toss the leeks with the olive oil, salt, pepper and thyme and roast them for 30 minutes until meltingly soft. Leave to cool, then drain off any excess oil. In a separate jug, make the custard by whisking together the eggs and cream, then season well with salt and pepper.
Begin to assemble the loaf: place the bread bowl on a baking tray and spread the goat’s cheese evenly on the base, then top with the leeks. Pour the eggs and cream into the bread bowl in three stages, waiting a few minutes each time before adding more. Once all the custard is added, carefully transfer to the oven. Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 170°C/ gas mark 3 and bake for a further 25–35 minutes until the custard is set. Check the custard is cooked by inserting a skewer into the middle; if it comes out wet, give it another 5–10 minutes. Leave it to cool for 45 minutes to an hour. It should look rather like a quiche, and you can slice it up to serve it in just the same way.
VARIATIONS: As long as you stick to the same measurements for the savoury custard (the eggs and cream), anything goes – think of your favourite quiche and reinvent it as a picnic bread pie.
TO MAKE IN ADVANCE: This can be baked the day before you want to eat it. Reheat at 180°C/gas mark 4 for 10 minutes to bring it back to life before packing up and heading out.
Like what you see? How about some more R29 goodness, right here?
We Have So Many Questions About Kylie Jenner's Matzo Ball Soup