good ol' fashioned fun at the fair!

buckets of baked french fries

If there was one thing I had to eat every day for the rest of my life it would be potatoes- I LOVE POTATOES- in my opinion, they in every way. (Yes...I eat carbs and lots of them!!) And the yummiest thing to make with potatoes would be french fries! I am always experimenting with different versions of french fries and so far this recipe from Food and Wine is my favorite way to make baked french fries-simple, healthy and full of flavor. I have tweaked the recipe a little and created my own unique dipping sauce and served them up in cute little tin buckets- a perfect side dish for a 4th of July cookout

Start by cutting potatoes into strips- the key to a well cooked, crispy french fry is evenly cut strips- in my opinion :)

Once the strips are cut, transfer to a bowl

Drizzle olive oil and toss- make sure all fries are covered with olive oil

Lay the fries in one layer on a baking sheet.

Bake in the oven at around 400-425 degrees or until crispy and brown (turn the fries in order to get both sides crispy)

While the fries are baking, prepare fresh herbs and garlic for flavor.

My herbs are growing like crazy right now so I picked sage, parsley, oregano and rosemary.

Mince the herbs.

Toss the herbs into a bowl and add minced or chopped garlic.

Mix together.

When the french fries are a nice crispy golden brown on both sides, add the herb and garlic mixture over the top. Cook for another 5 minutes or until the garlic is browned.

I don't like ketchup (weird eh?) so I decided to make some simple and unique dipping sauces with some of my favorite flavors.

Curry Dipping Sauce-

Generous sprinkle of curry powder

Mayo

1 pinch of sugar or a drizzle of honey

Spicy Mustard Dipping Sauce

spicy brown mustard

Mayo

salt and pepper

Cilantro Dipping Sauce

Cilantro pesto (left over from this recipe)

or finely minced cilantro

mayo

I filled little paper condiment cups (leftover from this project) with the different sauces.

Remove the french fries from the oven and toss with salt and pepper.

Now for the fun part! I found these cute little red, white and blue tin buckets in the $1 section at Target and knew they would be perfect to use for serving up my french fries this weekend! (After this weekend I will use them in my garden)

I lined each of the buckets with parchment paper

and added heaps of french fries- insert mouth watering here :)

Last, I topped each bucket with a different dipping sauce

string of lantern lights tutorial

We spend a lot of time grilling, eating and watching the sun set on our deck and for the summer I typically hang all kinds of lights and lanterns for an extra dose of whimsy. I wanted to purchase more lights to hang for the holiday weekend festivities but just couldn't bring myself to pay for something I knew I could make! I decided to pull out a string of red Christmas lights and transform a bag of tiny paper cups into a string of lanterns for a little red, white and blue decoration.

I started by painting the paper cups in a pretty shade of blue.

When they were dry I added simple doodles with a sharpie pen

and then filled in some of the doodles with white paint (for a little variation)

I covered all of the cups with doodles and set aside to dry.

If you don't want to doodle you could use collage, messy paint, a solid color or a even a stamped pattern on the surface

Last, I poked a hole in the bottom of the cups and inserted each of the lights.

And there you have it- a little bit of red, white and blue decoration for the holiday weekend entertaining- though I may just leave them up for the rest of the summer!