Next-Level Picnics

Event designer Nicole Leza sets the stage for fabulous alfresco feasts.

A lace tent fashioned by a local cabinetmaker sets a cozy scene.

Friends drink a toast to the season in the pretty, relaxed setting softened with rugs, blankets, and a variety of textured-fabric pillows culled from nearby stores and thrift shops as well as online sources.

Food trends come and go, but picnics are forever. The desire to eat a meal in a beautiful outdoor setting is timeless, and nowhere is this easier to accomplish than on the Central Coast, thanks to its picnic-friendly climate. Local event designer Nicole Leza, owner of Santa Barbara Picnic Co. (santabarbarapicnicco.com), takes picnicking to the next level, creating up-to-the-minute, memorable gatherings infused with bohemian style.

“The idea to start the company came to me because I like to go on picnics with my friends and boyfriend, but I was always sprucing it up,” says Leza. “I also wanted to allow people who are visiting from other places to have this unique way of experiencing the beauty of Santa Barbara.” The setting for the professional picnic designer’s premier picnic, an event for local lifestyle and food bloggers last summer, was the Santa Barbara Mission rose garden. From that point on, her business blossomed. “It really took off on Instagram,” she says. “That’s how most people find me.”

The rose garden is one of her primo picnic places, along with Alice Keck Park Memorial Garden and Ledbetter Beach, both also in Santa Barbara. For culinary offerings, most gatherings include Leza’s grazing boards with a variety of cheeses, charcuterie, seasonal fruits from the farmers’ market, and bread from Santa Barbara’s Oat Bakery. For more elaborate menus, she often works with local caterer Poe and Co. (poe-and-co.com). To celebrate peak picnic season, the two joined forces to create an alfresco brunch on a recent sun-splashed afternoon in Santa Barbara.

Nicole Leza, event designer and owner of Santa Barbara Picnic Co., enjoys the fruits of her efforts.

Shaved Asparagus Salad with Pecorino Cheese, Dill, and Lemon is one of the creative offerings on the menu by chef Jamie Poe of Poe and Co.

Leza elevates events with her custommade tables, canopies, and lace and macramé tents, along with area rugs, blankets, pillows, and other decor.

Chef Jamie Poe, co-owner of Poe and Co. with husband Jayson, gets her creative juices flowing by surveying local seasonal bounty. “Nature is often the inspiration for my menus,” Poe says, “and in Santa Barbara it’s hard to ignore. We’re surrounded by hilltop avocado groves, fields of strawberries, and an entire underwater world. There’s so much to play with!”

For the brunch-in-the-park menu, just-picked sweet berries are spotlighted at the start and finish in refreshing Hibiscus- Strawberry Sparklers and scrumptious Mini Mixed Berry– Chamomile Tarts. Asparagus is the very taste of spring, and here it’s the star of a salad, in which it’s complemented by the salty sharpness of Pecorino and the bright flavors of fresh dill and lemon zest. Spring Market Tartines are vibrant savory showstoppers: cracked-wheat sourdough bread slathered with scallion cream cheese and topped with avocado, pickled onion, cucumber, radish, snap peas, asparagus, endive, shaved carrot, and beet-pickled eggs. Poe brines the hard-boiled eggs in a pickling mixture with fresh beets, giving the whites a pretty pink rim and a slight tangy taste.

A grazing board is arranged with honeycomb-topped goat’s milk brie, aged Gouda, Manchego, goat’s milk Gouda, breadsticks, rosemary crackers, fig and olive crisps, mixed Manzanilla olives, dried apricots, red grapes, and dried orange and lemon slices.

Please pass the Spring Market Tartines—open-faced sandwiches topped with a rainbow of colorful spring veggies and beetpickled eggs.

When planning picnic menus, Poe suggests keeping the following in mind: “If it’s a hot day, think about what can be out baking under the sun. Nothing too saucy or messy to handle, and go for dishes that guests can eat with one hand while holding a drink in the other.”

Leza elevates events with her custom-made tables, canopies, and lace and macramé tents, along with area rugs, blankets, pillows, and other decor sourced mainly from Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, and Etsy. “I like to shop a variety of sources to find unique items from other parts of the world,” she says. Flowers add to the natural vibe, and Leza often turns to Alexis Ireland Florals (alexisirelandflorals. com) in Santa Barbara for organic-looking arrangements made with flowers sourced from local growers and markets. All the details come together to create a memorable celebration of the season.

Go for dishes that guests can eat with one hand while holding a drink in the other.

Mini Mixed Berry–Chamomile Tarts (opposite) are filled with vanilla-chamomile pastry cream, topped with crumbled shortbread and fresh blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, and garnished with chamomile flowers.