How to have the perfect picnic in a pinch, according to Country Life

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It is a truth universally acknowledged that all most people really want to eat outside are crisps and olives. Buy twice as many of both as you think you need. Marks & Spencer Extra Virgin Olive Oil Crisps with Black Truffle are chefs’ favourites for a reason, and, as Tom Parker Bowles says, you can’t beat jumbo Perelló Gordal Picante olives. Look out, too, for smoky griddled Turkish ones; many big supermarkets now stock them. Decant all the olives into Tupperware to avoid filmy pot lids flapping around and covering everyone in oil.

Heart set on serving picnic canapés? Get a box of Rahms Croustade Cases, which are packaged with travelling in mind, and bring a disposable piping bag of your chosen filling — ready-made dips come into their own here — plus scissors to snip the end off so you can assemble them in situ using the car boot as a workstation. If it’s a blustery day, you do this at your own risk.

If you feel compelled to make something, do a big pesto-pasta salad: a universal winner among all age groups and barely more work than boiling a kettle. Use the best pesto available (fresh or jarred) and the fiddliest pasta shape you can find: Northern Pasta Co’s deliciously nutty radiatori and casarecce, made from British-grown spelt in Cumbria, hold dressing brilliantly.

Do not, under any circumstances, try to transport a pavlova. Individually packaged puds are your friends and Bonne Maman will always see you right: the chocolate pots, crème caramels and impressively boozy babas au rhum are all tried-and-tested picnic fare. Alternatively, pop the company’s madeleines in the oven just before you set off, wrap them in foil and they’ll still be warm when you arrive. Could you conceivably get away with ducking out of sight, dusting them in icing sugar and passing them off as homemade? No comment.

Swish fizzy pop covers a multitude of sins, turning the most slap-dash spread into a Blytonesque delight. Belvoir’s delicious (and, crucially, not too sweet) sparkling elderflower, raspberry lemonade and ginger beer now all come in cans and Rapscallion Soda’s strawberry and rhubarb summer special editions are worth stocking up on.

A decent insulated flask isn’t only intended for keeping drinks hot — it’ll also keep Pimm’s, pale rosé or pre-mixed Bloody Marys ice cold. Black+Blum’s Explorer Flask features two built-in cups, a stable base that helps it to stay upright on grass and a removable strap so that you can stick it straight in the dishwasher when you get home.

Investing in advance in a melamine or enamel set of picnic plates means no last-minute shopping panic. Royal Doulton’s Pacific Outdoor melamine range and Toast enamel plates are guaranteed to attract compliments; John Lewis has stylish and good-value reusable designs.

Create an impression of picnic proficiency with accessories. Wicker hampers are a one-way ticket to a bad back: Fortnum & Mason has instantly recognisable eau de nil cool-bag totes and even an insulated backpack, all of which are as comfortable to carry as they are good-looking. The British Blanket Company’s rainbow-hued woollen picnic rugs all have waterproof backs and come with leather carrying straps — as Somerset Maugham put it, ‘there are few things so pleasant as a picnic eaten in perfect comfort’.

Finally, fold up two sturdy bin bags and stash them in your chosen carrier: one for rubbish and one for everything that needs to be washed when you get home.