pretending it's spring

Despite what our pretty, floral wall calendar tells us, we are still looking at a sea of white in our yard. All that snow is still lingering and today, while sunny, was a whopping 27 degrees accompanied by 20 mph winds. We are all a bit stir crazy and wishing spring would actually show its face around these parts.

In a bid to lift our spirits, tonight we had a quintessential upstate/western NY spring-summer BBQ. We grilled chicken leg quarters using the perennial favorite Cornell Chicken recipe and boiled us up some Syracuse salt potatoes that we dipped in a melted butter/parsley mixture. (Recipes for both the chicken and potatoes can be found here.) If you have yet to try these regional New York State favorites, you are truly missing out. Around here, this is your standard church or fire department barbecue fundraiser and a long time staple at the State Fair. Alongside we had watermelon wedges (way out of season courtesy of Costa Rica and our local grocery store) and a simple arugula salad dressed with lemon juice and olive oil. To drink, of course it was lemonade. To finish it all off, it had to be strawberry shortcake.

The girls are so desperate for spring, they were outside burying fallen branches in the ground in the hopes that they will suddenly sprout blossoms or leaves.