A Moveable Feast: French Inspired Picnic

I recently read A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway, and on the title page was a copy of this quote by the author:

"If you are lucky enough to have lived

in Paris as a young man, then wherever you

go for the rest of your life, it stays with

you, for Paris is a moveable feast."

Unfortunately I haven't been to Paris, though I still have a few years to be a young [wo]man and see if Hemingway's words ring true.  The novel, which is really more a collection of short memoirs, chronicles the writer's famous years in Paris during the 1920s. It takes place pre-The Sun Also Rises (his big break) when he was in his mid-twenties, a newly-wed, and was first beginning to rub elbows with the likes of Gertrude Stein and F. Scott Fitzgerald.  Much of the novel centers around eating and drinking, and Hemingway describes the refreshments of each event.  I'll admit there were times while reading I wanted to uncork a bottle of French white wine, don a straw hat, and go lie around in the park smoking cigarettes.  While this behavior was acceptable for a promising young writer in 1920s Paris, if I did the same thing at one our local parks (which are all actually playgrounds for children), I'd probably get, at best, dirty looks for puffing second hand smoke in the air, and at worst, arrested for drinking in public.

A still-life worthy of Picasso.

So I came up with another plan:  take the "moveable feast" mantra a bit more literally.  Moveable feast a.k.a. a picnic!  Now I could rustle up some french grub, get that bottle of wine I was talking about, and enjoy myself a la Hemingway in the back yard.

I knew I would buy some olives, brie cheese, and a loaf of french bread.  These items are all safe choices with any type of French white wine. I didn't have many affordable options at my local liquor store and eventually decided to purchase Barton & Guestier Vouvray of the Loire region, made with Chenin Blanc grapes for about $9.  I actually considered buying champagne since Paris is in the champagne wine-region.  If you plan to have your own moveable feast and have trouble finding a good French wine in your small town too, champagne is a good alternative.

I checked online for some easy French aperitifs and decided to attempt a ham and cheese white quiche.  Here's the link to the recipe I used:
http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-detail.asp?recipe=1033991

Don't mind us...we're just having lunch.

Overall, it was easy to make, but it took me a couple of tries to get the egg whites to thicken the way I wanted them to.  Achieving "firm peaks" from egg whites is not for the faint of heart and I advise using a mixer and not attempting it by hand.  Eventually I had beaten those egg whites to a decently firm consistency and the quiche ended up turning out really well although it exuded an amateur-esque appearance.  I added red onion to mine because I had it handy, but the recipe doesn't call for it.  Even though my quiche wasn't very pretty, it was a perfect finger food for the picnic.

By the time my sister Cheyanne and I had everything packed in the picnic basket, we had to giggle at how fancy it all looked.  We were under dressed for our own picnic!  We mused over how silly it would look if we took our French-inspired picnic to the pavilion at one of our local parks.  She jokingly played Beethoven while we sipped on our wine and nibbled on the brie.  What can we say?  We enjoy the finer things in life.