Picnic on a Plate (by G)

Tonight I though I would see out Summer by presenting a picnic on a plate (I actaully thought it was the last day of Summer but it turns out it was actually the first day of Autumn).

The picnic consisted of home baked and griddled bread, potted shrimp, chicken liver pate and pork pies.

The pate tunred out to be pretty bitter, the only thing I can atribute that to is that I didn't cook off the brandy for very long so it may have retained some of the alcohol taint. The pate was pretty much inedible.

For the potted shrimp I used regular cooked prawns and cut them into little pieces rather than using little shrimp. They were set in a pot with clarified butter flavoured with paprika, white pepper and nutmeg. They tasted mostly of mild prawn and butter - I don't know what happened to the flavour. The potted shrimp were edible but bland.

The pork pies were made with pork meat whizzed to a fine mince, pork hock, hickory smoked bacon, sage, shalot and pepper all wrapped up in a hot water pastry. Once the pies had been baked and cooled they were enriched with some pork stock and gelatin that was poured in through a hole in the top then cooled. The pork pies were very excellent - as is to be expected given they were based on a recipe by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Upon reflection I should just have made a dozen pork pies - maybe a couple of dozen...

Oooh, I forgot to mention the pickled vegetables from a jar - they were pretty unpalatable, I think they had been pickled in straight vinegar. That's put hair on the soles of your feet.