There is nothing better than taking a lazy summer afternoon to enjoy awesome food, with your feet in the grass under the warmth of the sun with great company. Most common picnic meals include mayonnaise-laden salads, heavy foods and all sorts of waste left behind. It doesn’t need to be that way.
Your picnics can be delicious, light and waste-free, ensuring that we feel vibrant and keep our planet happy for future generations of picnic-lovers!
Related: A Picnic Shabbat Menu
Simple Summer Picnic Guidelines:
- Easily portable
- Enjoyed at room temperature
- Easy and clean to eat
- Hearty and filling
- Protein, fat and fiber rich so you feel satiated
At a typical picnic, you’ll often find paper plates, plastic cutlery and disposable napkins! Rather than buying and bringing disposables for your picnic, aim to make your picnic basket waste-free.
Tips for Packing A Waste-Free Picnic:
- Large picnic basket and/or tote bags
- Sealable tempered glass containers
- Mason jars for your drinks and smoothies
- Glass straws that can be re-used over and over again
- Bamboo cutlery over plastic, or even better, take your cutlery from home and throw it in the dishwasher after
- Cloth napkins
- Lightweight unbreakable reusable dishes or compostable options
Healthy Picnic Recipes
Protein Powered Salad – Quinoa Tabbouleh
Photo by Catherine Farquharson
It is light, fresh and full of delicious herbs, seasonal tomatoes and protein with the quinoa and sunflower seeds.
Tangy Orange Chicken Sesame Wrap
These chicken wraps are healthy and taste oh-so-good. This is a great way to use leftover chicken.
Photo by Catherine Farquharson
This power smoothie is easy to make and is full of healthful ingredients.
Veggie Rice Wraps with Almond Dipping Sauce
Photo by Catherine Farquharson
For a picnic, you can pack these delicious summer rolls, in a tempered glass container with a slightly damp cloth to help keep the rice wraps moist and pack the sauce in a small mason jar.
This lunch concept also makes for an incredible addition to any picnic.
Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffin Top Cookies
These muffins are healthy-ish. They are lighter than traditional cookies and filled with good-for-you ingredients like bananas and oatmeal.
Want more ways to go zero waste? Try 7 Food Scraps You Should NOT Be Throwing Away
Recipes (Veggie Rice Wraps, Smoothie Power Bowl, Quinoa Salad) Excerpted from Undiet: Eat Your Way to Vibrant Health. Copyright © 2013 Meghan Telpner. Published by McClelland & Stewart, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.
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