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“YOU are a food scientist. Why can’t you use science to liven up our
picnics?” asked my wife Wendy, tired of being upstaged by neighbouring
picnickers. It was summer and we were at an open-air concert, the kind where the
ticket reads: “Bring a picnic and chairs”. This is not as innocent as it sounds.
The picnics in our part of rural Somerset are competitive affairs, with
candelabra and haute cuisine. Wendy, it seems, had had enough of prawn
sandwiches on a tartan rug.

It seemed a fair challenge, so as we listened to the music of Acker Bilk I…

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