Make A S’mores Bucket For Your Host

Happy weekend friends! We’re at Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire visiting friends for a couple of days. There are three families with ten kids combined and they are all having such a blast wake boarding, jetskiing and spending the whole day in the water!

We just love it here!

You know how I worked for a month straight on building our fire pit? Well check this out. Our friends have a huge rock on the beach that’s part of the natural landscape. It’s slightly concave on top and makes the perfect fire pit! How’s that for a stone fire pit that requires zero hard labor?!!

Sitting around the fire at night is one of our favorite parts of coming up here. We have had so many laughs around this fire over the years!

This is definitely one of my favorite hostess gifts for summertime barbeques! It’s is such an easy, fun and usable gift that you can put together quickly with items you pick up on your regular grocery store food shop! Look for sales on these things and stock up so you have extras for next time you’re heading to a BBQ.

Start with a basket or bucket of some kind. I love galvanized metal buckets because they’re inexpensive and make great vessels for drinks or snacks when entertaining outdoors. I dressed up this bucket with a mottled gold spraypaint finish for a Christmas party, and thought it would be great to give as a gift to dress up the packaged goods.

Let’s talk about taking the whole s’mores thing up a notch. The fixins for classic s’mores:  graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows. A crowd pleaser, but honestly I feel a little  meh  about this combo. You too?

(That’s my newly limed dining table peeking out by the way, I am so in love with it! More on that soon!)

Classic marshmallows are a must (however we have found those super-sized ones that are new to the market are just too much marshmallow for one s’more!)

Some interesting alternatives for the base and top – try Famous chocolate wafers (my all time fave!), small pretzels (the sweet & salty combo is so good!), or cookies. I like this Tate’s brand because they are super thin, but if you have the time, freshly baked sugar or chocolate chip cookies are divine in s’mores!

Hershey’s chocolate is always nice and melty, but Reeses are INSANE in a s’more, and Mark and I both love Ghirardelli chocolate squares (I used a bag of caramel squares for this basket, but the mint and dark chocolate squares are so good too. Had them last weekend!)  And have you tried York Peppermint Patties in a s’more?? OH MY!!!!!

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Currently my favorite s’more combo:

Famous chocolate wafers + Ghirardelli caramel square + perfectly toasted marshmallow.

Just one will do and is the perfect end to a summer day!

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The wooden s’mores sticks are widely available at grocery stores, but have you seen these extending forks? We love ours at home because the fire pit gets so hot and with these you can stand back from it a bit, plus they don’t char like the wooden sticks. (My kids like to roast hotdogs over the fire with them too.)

At home I like to set up a s’mores bar on a table with the sticks and forks, and all the fixings set out for everyone to help themselves.

 

Sitting around a fire with friends and family, music and marshmallows, love and laughter, what could be better?

Happy s’mores making and enjoy your weekend my friends! Thanks for visiting.