According to Jerrold’s satire “Picnic Reform,” British “Picnic- frequenters” must radically alter their “picnic gastronomy.”
Thomas Rowlandson’s satire Disappointed Epicures (1787)
Change is accomplished by eliminating the ordinary. “Could anything be more barbarous?” he asks “than the common picnic fare of England?” Could anything be worse eating alfresco than “substantial viands, ham, and beef,’ those greasy plummets called meat patties, a Stilton cheese, mounds of biscuits, cold fowls, glazed tongues, dozens of bottled beer — varieties of chemical mixtures dear to the British palate, as sherry pale or brown.”
Instead of typical fare, Jerrold offers a preposterous epicurean menu. Why cook at a picnic, he asks, when you can bring all the food ready-made? Take advantage of London’s “West End astronomic resources.” Jerrold suggests that a sophisticated picnicker purchase prepared food, or “potted luck,” from posh west End London shops. “Potted Lucks,” a pun on “potluck dinner,” seems a jab at the newly popular pretension of buying picnic foods from local purveyors.
If this is not a fake news picnic, Jerrold reports that on June 13, 1868, one of his epicureans cohorts served this menu. Who prepared the foods or where they might have been purchased is unknown. Presumably, the cost is not an issue.
Portage— Crécy. Vermouth de Turin
Hors d’oeuvres. — Salade d’anchois ; salade de homard ; caviare ; saucisson de Brunswick ; saucisson de Strasbourg aux truffes ; salame di Milan ; salame di Bologna ; olives d’Espagne ; anchois frais ; écrevisse ; potted tongue.
Punch à la Romaine
Entrées.—Fite de gibier de Yorck; pâté de volaille ; pâté de veau ; potted Strasbourg meat ; poulet aux truffes ; jambon de Yorck ; gigot d’agneau k I’anglais ; boeuf
Wines, — Xérès ; Bordeaux ; Champagne ; Carlowitz ; j Rudesheimer*
Dessert. — Fraises ; patisserie ; gruyere ; Roquefort. ‘
Café
Estratto di tamarindo.
“Potted Lucks,” a pun on “potluck dinner,” seems a jab at the newly popular pretension of buying picnic foods from local purveyors.
See William. B. Jerrold. “Picnic Reform,” The Epicure’s Year Book for 1869 (1869); https://archive.org/details/epicuresyearboo00unkngoog/page/n166/mode/2up?q=picnic; With illustrations Gustave Dore, Jerrold authored London: A Pilgrimage. London: Grant & Co., 1872.