Pickie lunches and teas are something that we like to do to use up all of our fridge gravel and bits and pieces. It feels really decadent and we do it if friends are coming. Sometimes we have luxurious food items, some times it is just bits of leftovers, dips that we have made, cheese, and crackers. You can use anything that you want. We have a lot of these after Christmas.
Ideas for items in a pickie lunch or tea
Today we had two kinds of crackers. and squares of bread Sometimes I will toast pitta bread or make toast and slice it into strips, use bread sticks, flat breads, or cheese straws and scones. I then add to the tray or platter things like cheese, hummus, pate, cream cheese, crisps, butter. pesto, crudities, grapes, nuts, quiche, pizza, strawberries, salad, meat. smoked fish, pickles, and today we had some left over macaroni cheese. You can add anything that you think will work. They can be as extravagant as you want, or as simple. The one below is one that we had after Christmas.
Presentation
How you present it is more important than what is on the tray or platter. I use little pots, and if we are entertaining I will use nice plates. If it just the two of us I don’t bother as much and will put it on a plate or tray. When I am entertaining I will present it on wooden platters or slates.
Home made is always best
We make a lot of our own hummus and fish pate and so we usually have something in. We also make a lot of dips, sauces, and pickles. Add this to home grown crudities and salad and your guests will be wowed by the taste with out it costing much. If you make it look nice, people will not realise that it is the fridge gravel, or that you are using bits and pieces up from jars in the fridge. They will think that it is posh! If there are not enough left overs or fridge gravel in the fridge, you can plan by buying things that will last, and have them for a few pickie lunches and teas over a few weeks.
We especially love this when working in the garden as it only takes 5 or 10 minutes to put together. This is what we had today. We treated ourselves as we have worked hard over this week. A few luxuries came out of the cupboard and freezer. If you are entertaining it is nice to make a jug of homemade lemonade or sangria to go with it. Do you do pickie lunches and teas?
Presentation is so important – definitely looks amazing
We don’t as much as we used to but do tend to freeze small amounts of left overs so we will sometimes have different dinners in that we have a small amount of one curry and a small amount of another 2 maybe and then have it with either rice, potato or even pizza crusts. (Sometimes my husband gets a pizza with vouchers so it is free) I don’t want to eat all of the plain crusts so cut them off and freeze. They go well with other meals, especially bolognaise with garlic butter on but go with curry plain.
The platter looks amazing, Toni.
We still have pickie lunches every now and then, particularly over Christmas.
When the children were young we would often use the leftovers creatively and tell the children it was a picnic. If it rained before the, “picnic,” we would banish the cat to the bedroom and sit on the floor to eat.
we love pickie teas though my son always called them scrap teas, cheeky monster! I love them, you can put anything and everything together. we always keep some special stuff back to add that bit of posh to it and make it feel posh pickie. We have a red table cloth that we’ve used since kids were tiny, youngest now 31, and it still gets pulled out today for these front room picnics.
We call them tids and bits dinners (from the movie The Other Sister) and except for all the small dishes to wash up, it’s a favorite of mine. Love your ideas as always. think I’ll start putting more on wooden breadboard… Nice!