If you were going on a picnic by a lake...

option 1 - a baquette or cuban bread, a couple of nice cheeses, grapes, strawberries, carrots, cucumbers, maybe some macadamia nuts or cashews

option 2 - cold fried chicken, potato salad, coleslaw, watermelon (or honeydew or cantaloupe or...)

Cut up watermelon, with burrata, arugula and a bit of balsamic…

Just had this at the lake yesterday!!

It was freaking delicious!

We had it at a vineyard, and today, we stopped at Trader Joe’s and bought everything to make it so we could have it this week!

You lay the arugula down, put the burrata in the center, cut up watermelon all around and drizzle with balsamic.

Grab a bit of everything on your fork and it’s sweet, savory, soft, creamy, crunchy, and warm and cold all at the same time!

We have a local restaurant that does “to go” charcuterie boards. I’d totally pick one up and pack it I a cooler full of drinks to graze all afternoon.

I want to try this. I can’t imagine the flavors together, and I find that is often true for the new recipes we love! Where does the crunch come in? Would you mind sharing rough ratios/estimates for the amounts used and size of the watermelon? Especially the burrata, I’ve never even heard of that before so not sure if it’s one you would use sparingly, or it’s an instance of more = better. Also, where does the crunch come from?

Depends on the crowd I think.
What I would eat, and my DBF and DS is totally different.

Sub sandwiches, potato/macaroni salad, chips and fruit. They’re pretty basic.

I planned to make caprese tonight. Now I think I’ll cut up some watermelon to go with it. That sounds delicious!

Fried chicken. Maybe it just seems delicious right now. We used to stop by KFC and take it up to the mountains and scamper through the streams when the kids were young. It was filling and then we got some exercise.

Cold fried chicken, potato or mac salad, grapes, cookies or brownies

Roaring hot would mean watermelon, Cuties and grapes are in the cooler. 

Sandwiches, wraps or spring rolls, granola bars, nuts and dried fruit would keep us happy. 

Anything that can be eaten with your fingers, like sandwiches, wraps (pre-made and cut in half), subs (again, cut up), sliced fruit, fried chicken, meatballs, deviled eggs, scotch eggs, scones, muffins, cupcakes, biscuits, crackers, cheese (incl. Laughing Cow triangles or Babybel cheese), biltong, dröewors. And drinks, of course.

ETA: I can't believe I forgot to say meat pies and sausage rolls. Both my countries will disown me🙈

I almost never want to eat outside when it’s hot. I find it hard to eat in the summer while being active. I would probably go the apples, grapes, cheese cubes, crackers and tons of water route.

Picnics are our everything!

I always start with some sort of cold pasta salad. It stretches and you can use whatever's on hand. Depending on how much time I have to prep I like making a fruit salad too. A few months ago I made an orange citrus glazed bundt cake that turned out great and was easy to slice into pieces and eat with our hands. Cookies are always A+ for travel. I've started using a loaf of italian bread to make a biiiiiiiiig sandwich to cut into pieces when we get there. It's been easier to travel with than multiple sandwich bags -- if we go with sammies as our "main" on that trip. Some sort of crunch -- crackers, chips, etc.

A few weeks ago my boyfriend asked for ambrosia salad and that traveled pretty well too lol

I like making berry lemonades and either taking it in a juice container or in separate mason jars with lids... it really depends on what else is in the cooler and if we have room.

If it was just my husband and me, I'd go for grapes, crackers, hummus and several different cheeses.

If there were other guests, I'd stop by a deli and have everyone pick out their own boxed lunch.