BBQing!

Earlier this week I had a friend visit from out of town and decided to make an event out of it by cooking up a delicious BBQ. It included homemade baked fries, a watermelon basil salad and obviously some good ol' beef burgers. I was pretty pleased with the outcome though I will say I did slightly overcook the burgers - good thing I seasoned them deliciously enough to kind of make up for it!

Below I've included the recipes for the fries and the salad should you be interested.

Oven Baked Fries with a Kick

serves: 4

Ingredients:

4-5 medium sized Idaho potatoes

1-2 tbls olive oil

A sprinkling (about 1-2 teaspoons) of 

• Cumin
• Herbs de Provence
• Thyme
• Seasoning Salt 
• Cayenne Pepper

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450°

2. Cut potatoes into long, skinny evenly shaped pieces and place in a large bowl.

3. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with seasonings then mix until all fries are evenly coated - add more olive oil and seasonings as needed to cover all fries.

4. Lay out fries on cooking sheet being sure to spread out into a single layer. 

5. Bake for 45 minutes.

As for the watermelon salad this one was grabbed from Martha Stewart here and turned out delicious!    

Enjoy!

Vacation Flashback

So this week has been back to the daily grind and needless to say it's been a tough transition. The good news is that I really like my job and the people I work with - the downside is that I haven't had more than a minute at home to clean, blog, unpack or reorganize my life - all in good time though I presume. In the meantime I've thrown together this flashback post so I might grab some time to unpack :p

Starting with Niagara Falls - Enjoy! (More after the jump)

The American Falls and the Bridal Veil Falls

Scenes from Vacationing Days

So I'm finally back home, back to work and back to trying to be productive in humidity. I can't believe how fast that vacation flew by - but talk about an incredible trip. I will definitely be sharing more details of what I saw and where I went soon but for now this is all I can manage - please enjoy these scenes from my vacation!

Independence Day Holiday Cocktail

Happy Independence Day Ya'll!

Hope you're all enjoying your day off, your BBQs and if you're on the East Coast like me, your rain and humidity! We actually had to change up our plans a bit since Boston decided to move up the day of their firework show but still an awesome time none the less.

The below recipe was actually concocted by my mother (with some help from all of us, and a few perfect mistakes) for our shore days at the finger lakes and it turned out incredible - a perfect beverage for fireworks, heat and BBQs.

Summer Reading List

Summer is by far one of my favorite times to get my easy reading done - just laying out on the beach, sitting on the porch or while in flight to a wonderful vacation you just can't go wrong with a good, easy read! This summer I'm looking forward to a couple great books that I either haven't had a chance to pick up yet (I might be the only person who hasn't read the Divergent series) or I've only recently heard of - either way I can't wait to dive into any and all of these.

- The Naked Pint: An Unadulterated Guide to Craft Beer - by Christina Perozzi & Hallie Beaune
- We Were Liars - by E. Lockhart
- Why We Suck: A Feel Good Guide to Staying Fat, Loud, Lazy and Stupid - by Dr. Denis Leary

- The Divergent Series - by Veronica Roth
- Where'd You Go Bernadette? - by Maria Semple

- The Queen of Tearling - by Erika Johansen (out July 8th) 

What do you guys think? Any great reads I need to add to my list for the summer? Read any of these and think they didn't live up to the hype?

xo 

Megan