What's For Breakfast? On The Grill, Of Course!

Rise and Shine...unfortunately the weather here in Buffalo isn't so shiny today, but I believe that little quote isn't talking about the Sun, but rather a command to each of us to rise up and be our best.  Let who you are shine to those around you.  Be radiant and warm in all you do.
So speaking of radiant, I just love the color and vibrancy of nectarines this time of year.

Nectarines are one of my favorite fruits.  I use them in salads, desserts, eat them in the car fresh from the farmer's market, and this week I tried them out on the grill.

Nectarines with greek yogurt drizzled with a bit of warmed honey mixed with vanilla balsamic vinegar is a perfect start to a grey morning.  The sweetness of the nectarine marries perfectly with the tart balsamic vinegar, and then the creamy texture of the greek yogurt, just makes for a complete symphony  that makes my taste buds want to do a happy dance.  I used plain Greek yogurt, but if you prefer a flavored variety, go with that. I also use a very thick and concentrated balsamic vinegar.  You'll want to splurge for the good stuff here, as it's almost like a syrup.  This recipe only takes about 5 minutes to make, so even if your morning is a bit rushed, you can start the day out right with a healthy breakfast.

This would be equally delicious, but a little more indulging,  substituting mascarpone cheese for the Greek yogurt.  Now THAT would make for  a wonderful dessert.

Nectarines with Greek Yogurt & Honeyed Vanilla Balsamic Vinegar

Ingredients

2 Nectarines

Blood Orange Olive Oil (or plain extra virgin olive oil)

1/2 cup Plain Greek Yogurt, divided among the four nectarine halves.

3 Tbs. Honey

1-2 Tbs. Vanilla Balsamic Vinegar 

 Preheat grill or grill pan to high.  Cut nectarines in half and remove the stone, then brush a small amount of extra virgin olive oil on the cut sides of nectarines.  Place on grill and cook for about 2 minutes per side.

While nectarines are on the grill, place honey in a small microwave safe bowl, and heat honey for about 10 seconds, then add balsamic vinegar. Stir to combine.

Remove nectarines from grill and plate.  Add a dollop of yogurt on top of nectarine, then drizzle with the honey balsamic vinegar mixture.   

Serves 2 or 1 VERY hungry person.

30 Days On The Grill

This is a month of firsts....first blog and first cooking challenge to myself.  My goal is to do 30 Days On The Grill.  Not exactly consecutive, as life happens and there are days my family wants to head to a food truck rodeo or that we are not home to cook.  I am already a week into my challenge and decided this would be a good excuse to try out my blog.    I will backtrack to a week ago and share my 30 Days on the Grill journey.
For starters I searched out Pinterest and discovered a breakfast pizza via HowSweetEats
This is how mine turned out.

I will first say that this was out of this world good.  My 2 kids, Isabella and Atticus loved it, as did my husband.  My little footnote here is that if you have never grilled pizza before, it may take a few tries to get good and comfy with it.  The good news is that even though I thought that the dough was going to be a disaster, it turned out in the end and it was a great success.  A few things to mention:

 If you are going to be grilling your bacon, as I did on skewers...be prepared for big grease flare ups.  You may even want to have the number of your local fire department on hand.  I was constantly rotating my bacon from flames, to cold side of the grill til things simmered down.   All in all, have no fear, bacon turned out perfect.  I wish I knew I was going to be starting a blog...I would have definitely taken more photos. A photo of the flames would have been scary impressive.

My eggs seemed to take forever to cook, so as the dough started getting close to going from deliciously toasted to point of no return burnt, I removed the pizza to a pizza pan and for the last few minutes gave the eggs a blitz under the broiler unit in my oven.   That did the trick and moments later a family of four devoured this new discovery.