Anyways, summer has been in full-swing in GA for months and will not be stopping until December, by the looks of it.  That means it must be at least sort of warm where you live, too, right?  And warm means outdoor activities, and my favorite outdoor activity is a good old-fashioned picnic.  Always has been, it’s just one of my things.

Before I share some picnic perfect foods with you this month, I want to give you a little run-down of my favorite picnic goods.  Maybe you’ve never been on a picnic before.  Or maybe you’ve forgotten what to take.  Maybe your girlfriend asked you to take her on a picnic and you googled ‘picnic essentials’? Whatever the case may be, here are a few things I like to have at the ready.

 First, you’ll need some stylish essentials like a vintage-style cooler, eco-friendly utensils and a classic picnic blanket. (I am jonesing for a Pendelton blanket like nobody’s biz!) A good cooler is key for hot days, even if it’s not super stylish.  A blanket is also key- you don’t want bugs crawling on you/your food or your date sitting on a bunch of rocks. When it comes to plates and utensils, I love using Bambu products if I need something disposable and reusable glass containers for everything else.

(via Pinterest, here and here)

Let’s talk about location. How cute are these little car picnics?  I love the idea of a picnic in the back of a pick-up truck. (Husband, take note!) Really, though, you can have a picnic just about anywhere.  We’ve done park picnics, backyard picnics, car picnics (this time i mean inside the car).. really. You can make any location work, but if you want to make it special, pick a beautiful location or an offbeat spot that you love.

(via Pinterest, here and here)

Once you’ve got your basic supplies and location, the key to making a picnic memorable is the ambiance.  If you’re doing an evening picnic, think candles, lanterns and the like.  If you’re going for daytime and you’ve got some flexibility at your location, try hanging paper lanterns, streamers, balloons or garlands.  Pillows are always a great addition, and don’t forget a playlist of your favorite tunes!

And of course, the all important food!  Can’t have a picnic without good eats. I won’t be sharing any recipes with you today, but I will say the following are my favorite grab and go picnic treats:

-good bread (usually baguette or fresh baked type)

-good cheese

-fruit (depending on the cheese, we usually go with grapes, apples or berries on the fly)

-veggies for snacking

-sometimes we include some meat if we want to make sandwiches

-fun fizzy drinks or a bottle of wine

-some kind of sweet treat that won’t melt in the heat

One of our favorite things to do is to go on a little grocery trip (usually to a fancier grocery as a treat to ourselves) and pick up whatever looks delicious and take it away for a picnic.  It’s one of the simplest meals (really no preparation) and the picnic setting is perfect for good conversation.  We love it for date nights at home or away and we cherish picnics with friends.  We always end up with new memories.

I can’t wait to share some of my favorite picnic recipes and tips with you this month.

What about you? Are you a picnic person?

I chose four recipes to test: Smitten Kitchen’s All Butter Crust, Dorie’s Good For Almost Everything Pie Crust, Cook’s Illustrated Foolproof Pie Dough and Alton Brown’s Pie Crust.  I had some helpful taste testers to judge the first three (SK, D and CI) and hubs and I gave Alton’s a try a few days later.  Lots of thoughts to follow- let’s get going.

 Smitten Kitchen: I always have high hopes for SK recipes, so I was excited to try her all-butter recipe. She prefers the old-fashioned hand-mixed method, so this one had a little extra elbow grease mixed in.  It came together nicely and was one of the easiest to roll out.  I used this dough for SK’s Sour Cherry Slab Pie, which was the favorite pie of my taste-testers.  That could be because it had the highest crust to filling ratio, or because the crust was thicker.  Regardless, it was the flakiest and got the most compliments.

 Dorie: I was disappointed with Dorie for the first time here!  This was my least favorite of all the recipes.  It browned (read: burnt) too quickly in the oven and shrank back a lot during baking.  It looked so promising before it went into the oven.  I used Dorie’s crust as the base for this Lemon Meringue Pie from Zoe Bakes.  This one was quickly taken out of the running.

 Cook’s Illustrated: The CI recipe was the easiest to pull together and the least fussy of the four recipes.  The secret ingredient here was cold vodka in place of half of the usual water.  I used the CI crust for a double crusted Apple Pie- a good choice, since it was the easiest for me to roll out and work with.  More testers ate the apple pie than the cherry slab pie, but they still picked the SK crust over the CI crust.  I think this crust is a good choice, but not as flaky or buttery as SK.

Alton Brown: Our good man Alton has a very specific way to execute his recipes, doesn’t he?  For this pie crust, he called for a spray bottle to add water to the dry ingredients.  I have to say that I’m not sure it made that big of a difference.  I used the AB crust for most of the Cherry Berry Hand Pies (I had some extra crust from the other recipes to use up as well).  It was a tasty crust, but I couldn’t tell much of a difference between the CI recipe.

Lemon Meringue Pie: Dorie’s crust, Zoe’s filling and meringue
Cherry Slab Pie: SK’s crust and filling

Brown Sugar Apple Pie (with one of my little pie birds!)
Cook’s Illustrated Crust and filling from Pie

Cherry Berry Hand Pies: AB’s crust with my own filling

Conclusions:
For me, I think the winner is definitely Smitten Kitchen.  It was the biggest crowd pleaser.  There were good points about Alton’s recipe and the CI recipe, but my all-purpose pick is SK.  That being said, I think there are things you can do with any pie crust recipe to get the best results.

• Make sure your ingredients are COLD. That means your butter, your water, your flour, everything.  This is huge.
• Chill the dough in between steps.  This is time consuming, but helps the texture in the end.
• Only roll your dough once, if possible.  All of the pie doughs were difficult to roll out after the initial roll.  They became elastic and started to shrink back- that means tough crust.
• Use flour liberally while you’re rolling to keep dough from sticking.
• Make sure steam can escape your pie, whether it’s using a pie bird or just poking holes with a fork.
• Have fun and take it easy! I always make pie such a big deal, but it’s really not.  It’s fun and delicious and you should be smiling while you’re making it.

I’m glad I finally dug in and did some pie research.  I’m no longer afraid of the pie, but I’ll still probably employ the lazy pie techniques like the galette and slab pie.  It’s just my way.  I hope this comparison was helpful to you if you’ve been searching for a recipe, too.

(Special thanks to my little helper! And by helper, I mean a giant mess maker. As if I don’t make enough of a mess when I bake alone.. maybe he got it from me?)

In the interest of full disclosure, I’m about to show you my first attempt at macarons.

I want you to see the whole learning process.  Good, bad and ugly.

Let’s start with the ugly.

So macarons are known as one of the most difficult cookies to make.  The ingredients must be precise, your mixing technique must be perfect, your sheet pans level, your oven at the right temperature.  There are a lot of things to think about.  For my first try, I decided to go with a simple vanilla bean macaron.  The resource I found most helpful was Not So Humble Pie– she has great macaron tutorials and troubleshooting guides.

I aged my egg whites.

I weighed my ingredients.

I had a well-mixed meringue.

I let them rest before baking.

I popped any air bubbles.

I over/under mixed the batter (still not sure).

I piped them too large.

I baked half of them on an older, possibly crooked baking sheet.

I overbaked a little.

Exhibit A: uneven, blob-like shapes.  I think this is due to the possibly crooked baking sheet and the incorrect mixing technique.

Exhibit B: Side view of my cookies.  This give me hope! They have feet (the bottom part of the cookie), which is a good sign.

Exhibit C: The inside of the cookie.  This is hopeful too, since there aren’t a lot of air pockets.. but that could always be because they are too flat.

I am planning another attempt soon.  Hopefully it will go a little better.  I’m going to pipe them a little smaller,  make sure I mix correctly,  and try not to screw it up!

Has anyone made macarons before?  How did it go for you?  Any tips?

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To round out the month, I wanted to share with you some of my favorite tips for lightening up your own recipes.  Many of these are common sense, but good reminders of what to keep on hand in a health-conscious home.

Hopefully these few tips will help you to lighten up your own meals at home.  Lord knows there are a lot of recipes out there that need it! (I’m looking at you, Paula and PW.)

 Also, I’m really looking forward to next month in the Great Food Adventure.  February is all about macarons!  Can’t wait to try them.  I’m going to OD on sugar, for sure.  The things I do for you guys!

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