It's Picnic Season!!!!

So it should be obvious by now that I love summer picnic season. Living in LA it is often nice enough to picnic year round but between Hollywood Bowl, Cinespia, and Malibu Wines there are lots of opportunities this time of year. Plus getting a group together to enjoy a fun activity along with your picnic makes it so much more fun!

This past Saturday we kicked off summer with a great evening at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery for the Cinespia screening of Vertigo. In an effort to keep things simple (and because I love to make food for a group), I assembled much of the base for our picnic with everyone bringing extra items to snack on. One thing I always find at the cemetery screenings - you will never go hungry!

Turkey, Goat Cheese, & Red Pepper Sandwich

(Note: All ingredients are from Trader Joe's but similar items can be found at any market.)

1 Kalamata Olive Loaf (or your favorite bread)

1 8oz Package Roasted Turkey Breast

2oz Goat Cheese (I used 2 1oz Fresh Goat Cheese Medallions)

5oz Roasted Red Peppers (approximate as I used about a 1/2 of a 12oz jar)

1/2 teaspoon Prepared Pesto (approximate)

1 teaspoon Non-Fat Greek Yogurt (approximate)

1. Slice olive loaf in half longways.

2. Spread the inside of both the top and bottom of the loaf with goat cheese.

3. Place entire package of turkey on bottom side of loaf on top of the goat cheese.

4. Place roasted red peppers on top of turkey. You want to create a layer of red pepper.

5. Mix prepared pesto and greek yogurt together. These quantities and ratios are approximate as you should make it to taste.

6. Spread pesto yogurt mixture on top side of the loaf on top of the goat cheese.

7. Close sandwich and cut into desired number of pieces (I cut mine into three pieces).

8. Add toothpicks if you wish to keep sandwich pieces together while moving to your picnic location.

9. I recommend packing in a plastic container to minimize damage but if that is not available wrapping in foil and keeping it at the top of your cooler is the next best option.

Before

After

Three-Melon Mozzarella Salad

This salad is actually from Real Simple so I can't take credit for it. The link to the original recipe is above. I did make a few modifications and they are as follows:

• Subtracted Honeydew (mostly because I am not a fan and it's also not available pre-cut at the market) and Added additional Watermelon and Cantaloupe.

• Substituted Dorot Chopped Frozen Basil (frozen fresh) for the Fresh Basil (I can never go through an entire package of fresh basil before it goes bad!).

Before

After

In addition to the above items, I also picked up the delicious Goat Cheese, Walnut, Red Bell Pepper Salad from Trader Joe's.

And if that still wasn't enough cheese, we also enjoyed Italian Truffle Cheese and what I believe was a Porter Cheese. As I mentioned there was tons more food including dessert (Powerberries) and wine!

Here we are sitting back and enjoying our wonderful picnic!

And a few photos of the film itself!

Can't wait to go back in a couple weeks for one of my favorite films of all time - Heathers!

For more fun picnic ideas, don't forget to check out my previous posts on the Table in a Bag & Steady Sticks!