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Champagne
Pop! Fizz!
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Champagne is the drink of choice if you’re planning a posh picnic, or you just like champers!
Apparently the British do in particular! I gather we consume more of it than any other country after France.
We know it’s a very versatile tipple because you can serve it before, during and after the food. No worrying about what wine to serve with what - just serve bubbly - and something soft.
Orange juice – the real squeezed stuff – is a good choice because its great on its own or mixed with the bubbly, to make Bucks Fizz.
If you want to serve something else alcoholic as well, try Guinness, nice and cold. This also mixes with the bubbly to make Black Velvet and it gives people another choice of drink.
Bucks Fizz and Black Velvet can be served throughout the party but if you just want to start off the picnic with something a little different, and then go on to neat fizz, you might like to serve one of the following cocktails:
A sparkling Ginger cocktail is simply made by adding a slice of stem ginger and 2 teaspoons of the syrup it comes in, to each flute.
Turn it into rose-scented Champagne by adding 10 ml of Sirop de Rose from Monin. This is great for a wedding or romantic picnic. Scatter a rose petal or two on the top.
Fruit purée can be made ahead (2 days max.) and chilled until needed. Try strawberry or peach. Mixed with bubbly, this is a most agreeable combination..
We had a peach purée one for our wedding cocktail, to match the colour of the bridesmaids. We choose a fabulous garden setting so I wish I could say we had a picnic but it rained all day! Luckily the food was just as good eaten indoors and we still had a fabulous time. Yes, we got married in England!
But I digress . . . . to make peach or strawberry, or any other soft fruit, purée, liquidize the fruit with a little icing sugar (about a tablespoon per 450 g of fruit) and then pass through a fine sieve into a bowl, discarding the seeds and any other lumpy bits. Cover and chill. At the picnic, put a spoonful of purée into a glass and top up with chilled Champagne.
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