Dinner on the grill

Last night I was cooking for one, which is usually BORING (not to mention difficult!) but I decided to take advantage of the sunny day and fire up my grill. I kind of made things up as I went, and it ended up surprisingly good.

Herb stuffed chicken for one--
1 chicken breast
a bunch of fresh herbs (I had fresh parsley and basil on hand)
olive oil
1 clove garlic
lemon
two strips of bacon
tooth picks

First I made a fresh rough-chop pesto. So, I smashed up a clove of garlic, chopped up a big handful of flat leaf parsley and then basil. I have two varieties of basil in my house. One is the standard basil you'd get everywhere, and the other (of course I don't remember the name) has as smaller leaves and a fruitier flavor. For this, I used a combination of both. I added a splash of olive oil , a bit of lemon zest (and one squeeze of juice) and salt and pepper.
Next, I preheated the grill on Medium-High.
To stuff the chicken, I took a paring knife and cut a pocket into the chicken where it is thickest. I shoved all the pesto in. There was more pesto than could fit, but that was okay. I wrapped the overflowing chicken in bacon to hold in all of the goodies, and then ran toothpicks through the end to hold it all together. I threw this on the grill for 20 minutes, turning once (beware of flareups from the bacon!) Wrapping the chicken in bacon ensures that you will end up with juicy and tender meat, even if you leave it on the grill too long.

To serve, I sliced it thinly. In hindsight, I should have just left it whole. The bacon fell apart and it just got ugly. But it tasted pretty good!

Green Beans
1 serving of frozen green beans
1TBSP olive oil
salt and pepper

These were super easy and surprisingly delicious. I took 1 sheet of aluminum foil, sprayed the bottom, and then threw the frozen beans down, and drizzled the oil and seasonings over the top. I sealed up the foil packet and threw it on the grill for about 8 minutes. I make fresh veggies this way (potatoes in particular) fairly often, but this was my first foray into the frozen/grill world. The beans turned out great! They were tender, the ones on the bottom of the packet picked up the grill marks, but the whole packet developed a great smokey flavor. I can't wait to try grilling other veggies!