Grilled Poundcake with Blueberry Chamomile Butter

My favorite part of any holiday including the fourth of July is the morning of. I love the quietness of it and just taking it nice and easy. And this grilled pound cake with blueberry butter that has a hint of chamomile and vanilla is just the thing to enjoy in the calm of the morning. Enjoy and I hope you have a great 4th of July!

• 1 pint whipping cream
• 3/4 cup blueberries
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 bags of chamomile tea or loose tea about about 2 tablespoons
• 1/4 cup confectioners sugar
• 1 pound cake, cut into thick slices
• butter flavored cooking spray
• raspberries on the side

Bring the whipping cream and the chamomile tea bags to a light boil. Remove and let it cool. Once cool, let it sit in the fridge overnight. Use bags that don't have metal staples in them. Once you bring it out of the fridge, this gets a little messy but it's worth it, remove the tea bags scraping any cream that has surrounded them. Squeeze the tea bags well, you want all of the chamomile essence in the cream. I ended up breaking one of the bags and left some of the chamomile leaves in the cream. Stir in the blueberries, vanilla extract and the confectioners sugar in and with a hand blender combine well until it begins separating. Once you see that the cream has come together into a consistency of butter, you want to strain it in a cheesecloth, (I used a paper towel) to get all of the liquids out. Once all you have is butter, you can use it right away or form it. You can put it into a decorative bowl and cover or form it into a log and roll in parchment paper. Fire up the grill and spray your poundcake slices and grill them until you get some nice marks. They grill up quickly. Spread your butter on them and it's a yummy start to a day of celebrating independence. :)

Avocado Egg Breakfast

Ohhh...this is great if you want a hearty breakfast and you love avocados. It's really good together. The yolk of the egg swimming in the hollow of the avocado. Perfect combined with little bites of breakfast sausage and mushrooms covered in a thick tomato sauce. And I don't know about you but English muffins make me happy, lol. The nooks and crannies filled with eggy avocado goodness is a good start to the day. I know it's only Monday, lol but this is great on an easy Sunday morning. Something really yummy to look forward to. :)

• 1 avocado, halved with the pit removed
• 2 eggs
• 6 breakfast sausages, casings removed
• 4 small tomatoes, cut into wedges
• 2 button mushrooms, sliced thin
• 2 English muffins, toasted
• 2 pats of unsalted butter
• fresh ground pepper

Add your sausages to your pan, breaking them up. Once they cooked through for the most part, add in your mushrooms. Saute the mushrooms until they are lightly browned. Add in the chopped tomatoes and cook on low heat until the liquids of the tomato release. Once they do, increase the heat to medium and let the liquids evaporate and thicken. Once it's thickened, you can set it aside. Next, remove your avocado half in one piece, gently run a big spoon in between the skin and the avocado. Once it's loose you can scoop it out in one piece and place your avocado halves on your plates. Heat up your pat of unsalted butter until it's sizzling. Break your egg into the butter until it's set. I always salt it. Maybe it's my imagination but the yolk always breaks when I try to flip it, without salting the egg yolk. Then flip your egg until it's set on the other side and it's done over easy. Take a spatula and remove the egg and place it over the avocado half, with the yolk part sitting in the hollow of the avocado. Repeat with your second egg. Toast your English muffins and place them on your plate, add the sausage and mushroom saute and top with fresh ground pepper. This makes 2 servings. Enjoy!