PICNIC Definition & Meaning

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picnic

[ pik-nik ]

Phonetic (Standard)IPA

an excursion or outing in which the participants carry food with them and share a meal in the open air.
the food eaten on such an excursion.
Also called picnic ham, a section of pork shoulder, usually boned, smoked, and weighing 4–6 pounds. Compare daisy ( def 2 ).
Informal. an enjoyable experience or time, easy task, etc.:
Being laid up in a hospital is no picnic.

picnicked, picnicking.

picnic

/ ˈ��ɪ��ɪ�� /

a trip or excursion to the country, seaside, etc, on which people bring food to be eaten in the open air
1. any informal meal eaten outside
2. ( as modifier )
  a picnic lunch
informal.
a troublesome situation or experience
no picnic informal.
a hard or disagreeable task

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Origin of picnic¹

1740–50; < German Pic-nic (now Picknick ) < French pique-nique, rhyming compound < ?

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Origin of picnic¹

C18: from French piquenique, of unknown origin

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"It goes quickly," he said, with a school trip, a picnic or a day out usually taking up a big chunk of that spending money.

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The very name conjures images of sweltering summer picnics, soggy sandwiches and a kind of lowbrow indulgence we don’t like to admit we enjoy.

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Muhammad's family said he was having a picnic with friends.

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Lucy Dacus sits at a picnic table in Elysian Park blinking against the sun on a windy afternoon in early March.

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“I find it cynical,” Lund, 33, tells me as we sit on a picnic table in Elysian Park across from a field with teenage boys at baseball practice.

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

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