Grilling Fruit 101 by Natalie

End of summer is a funny time—simultaneously craving the return of pumpkin madness, yet eating as much sweet, ripe stone fruit and melon as you possibly can before they’re gone for another year.

We live in Northern Nevada with June-September farmer’s markets, and I get so excited when they open! To be honest, I don’t create many fruit-based dessert recipes because I prefer to eat them as is. They’re such a treat by themselves!

The same goes for Nutella. All I need is a spoon.

 
 

If you have an abundance of fresh summer fruit or are looking to make something a little fancy (but easy!) for dessert, try grilling it! Stone fruit works well and so do figs. Melon is an unexpected choice, but also delicious.

Now, I’m going to show you three different ideas for grilling fruit and some general tips.

 
 

Grilled Pluots with Yogurt and Almond-Ginger Brittle

Stone fruit is the most popular choice for grilling, so we’ll start there. Peaches, plums, nectarines, and apricots all work well! My personal favorites are pluots—a hybrid of a plum and an apricot.

I’ve been tempted to stick them in my hidden chocolate stash because my kids are in love with them, too.

For these, I simply grilled them and then topped them with vanilla almond milk yogurt and a ginger-almond brittle I whipped up while the fruit was grilling. You can find the full recipe down below!

 
 

Grilled Figs with Orange-Scented Honey

Figs are somewhat new to me, and I’m wondering why it took so long to try them fresh! (Possibly because I disliked Fig Newtons as a kid?)

I topped these grilled figs with an orange and vanilla-infused honey. This is seriously so easy, so elegant, and they’re good even when they’re room temperature!

You could use infused honey on stone-fruit or melon, too!

 
 

Grilled Prosciutto-Wrapped Cantaloupe

This one is bit unconventional. Have you ever had prosciutto-wrapped cantaloupe? If you haven’t I can imagine the look you have on your face right now. I had the same look on my face when I was offered some for the first time by a lady in Austria. She had just returned from her vacation in Italy where she had eaten prosciutto-wrapped cantaloupe. If the Italians are doing it, it must be good, right? It has a fabulous salty-sweet vibe going on. Delish.

I took it a step further and grilled the whole thing. I think I like it this way even better! Grilling the prosciutto makes it a little crispy, giving it a bacon-like taste.

 
 

All right. Now for some basic tips.

1. Make sure the fruit is ripe enough to taste good, but not too ripe. If it’s mushy to start with, you might end up with jam after it’s grilled. Depending on your goal, this might not be a bad thing.
2. Always spray the cut-side of the fruit with nonstick spray. The sugars from the fruit do a really nice job of adhering to grill grates. Don’t leave half of your fruit behind because it sticks!
3. Grill it hot and fast. You’ll want some nice grill marks to form, but if the grill isn’t really hot, it’ll take a long time for those to form. You don’t want to grill fruit for a long time or it’ll start to break down and get really mushy. Just 2–3 minutes should be enough time.

 
 

Grab some farmer’s market fruit and get grilling before summer ends!