Picnic Bread (From South Africa)
Overview
Picnic bread is a South African savoury quick bread, heavy with cheese, spring onion and bacon, bound with egg, and made to be eaten cold in a slice with nothing on it. The category matters. It is a quick bread, raised chemically rather than with yeast, which means no proving and no kneading. Everything is mixed and baked. That is much of why it exists: it is a bread that can be made in an evening for the next day without planning. Its association is with food carried away from home. It is described as an old recipe favoured by fishermen for their packed lunches and by schoolchildren, and the reasoning is visible in the recipe itself. It needs no butter because there is enough fat in it already. It holds together in a slice rather than crumbling. It does not dry out the way a plain loaf does. And it is dense enough that one slice is a meal rather than an accompaniment, which is exactly what you want on a boat or a long day out. The texture is unusual for a bread. It is moist, almost pudding-like in the middle, without being heavy, and the cheese keeps it soft for days. It is honest about what it is: nobody has ever pretended this is a low-fat recipe.
AFN Heritage Note
Picnic bread is recorded as an old South African quick bread favoured by fishermen for packed lunches and by schoolchildren, a chemically raised loaf designed to travel, keep without drying, and serve as a meal in a single slice.
Ingredients
Directions
- 1
Set oven on 350 deg F.
- 2
Grease well 2 fairly small bread tins.
- 3
Mix all the ingredients except the buttermilk.
- 4DO NOT fry the bacon
it goes in raw, chopped: it cooks in the baking process and adds to the flavor.
- 5
Add JUST enough buttermilk to make a soft, almost sticky dough, as for scones. You may not even need the buttermilk, as the consistency will also depend on the size of the eggs used.
- 6
Divide batter between the 2 tins.
- 7
Bake about 1 hour in the preheated oven, or until a skewer comes out clean.
- 8
Turn out and cool on a rack.
Africook’s Notes
- Do not overmix. It is a quick bread, stir until just combined, and lumps in the batter are fine. Overworking makes it tough.
- Grate the cheese coarsely. Fine grating melts away into the crumb; coarse leaves pockets of it.
- Cook the bacon first and drain it. Raw bacon releases fat into the batter and leaves the loaf greasy.
- Let it cool completely before slicing. Cut warm it crumbles; cold it slices cleanly, which is the point of it.
- It keeps three to four days wrapped, and is arguably better on day two.
Reviews
5 reviews
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Had to pop into two different supermarkets before I finally spotted Aromat in the international aisle, but I'm so glad I tracked it down. The raw bacon trick worried me a bit as I thought it might go soggy, but it cooked perfectly inside the loaf. Delicious sliced cold for lunches.
Emily, that hunt for Aromat in UK supermarkets is no be small thing! I had to check two shops here in Birmingham before I got one sha. I was also quite nervous about putting the raw meat straight into the loaf, but my spiced beef strips cooked perfectly inside. It really sweet cold for lunch o.
Putting raw bacon inside dough had me skeptical abeg, but it cooked fine in the oven. Only issue is 2 teaspoons of aromat made it far too salty when paired with all that cheddar and bacon. Next time ill drop the seasoning salt to half or skip it completely.
You are so right about the Aromat, it is very salty! Between the cheddar and the halal smoked beef I used here in Bristol, two teaspoons was far too much. I cut the seasoning salt down to half a teaspoon, just like how I go easy on stock cubes when making benachin, and the balance was much better.
Make sure you dont pour all the buttermilk at once! I used 8 jumbo eggs and the dough was already wet enough like scone mixture before the milk even touched it. The chili sauce gave it proper kick sha, e sweet well well with the melted butter.