Croissant Breakfast Bake

I recently spent the weekend in Asheville, North Carolina with nine ladies from the Alpha Omega Alumni Chapter. We had our first ever Alumni Retreat. It went so well and we had a fantastic time! We stayed in a cabin which allowed us to cook a few of our meals. 

For breakfast, I made a variety of muffins, but I also wanted something savory. I searched Pinterest and was originally going to make an egg casserole. Then I stumbled upon a recipe using croissants. Automatic winner! It was easy to make and everyone loved it! The original recipe is from Just a Pinch Recipes.

Bacon wrapped pimento cheese stuffed okra

I grew up mainly in the lowcountry of South Carolina. Because neither of my parents are Southern, I did not eat a lot of Southern cuisine when I was a kid. I probably would not have enjoyed much of it anyway because I was such a picky eater. I'm a quarter Italian and I did not even like spaghetti sauce for the longest time!

Over the years my palette has expanded greatly. One food item that I did not give a chance until a couple years ago was okra. It took living in California and having dinner with a friend from Washington state for me to try it. And it was delicious! Of course, it was the fried variety, so how could that not taste good?

Fast forward to moving back to the South... We have planted our vegetable garden and I included okra. It has been growing quite nicely lately and I have amassed a lot of okra from it. I did not realize the plant has such beautiful, delicate flowers.

Having never cooked it before, I searched Pinterest for some recipes. I found one that sounded perfect... bacon wrapped stuffed okra! The actual recipe calls for a shrimp filling. I'm still a picky eater; I don't eat seafood. But I was planning on making pimento cheese with our homegrown pimento peppers. Wouldn't that taste amazing stuffed inside a bacon wrapped piece of okra? I think so!

Fourth of July gave me the perfect opportunity to try this dish. It was easy to assemble and tasted FANTASTIC! It is just as good as fried okra...if not better.

For the pimento cheese, I kind of followed the recipe from Eleven Magnolia Lane. It's OK, but I've had better. I just have to find the recipe! Feel free to use your own favorite recipe or store bought (if you have to).

For the okra, I followed the instructions from I Heart Publix. The recipe suggests using regular bacon and not thick cut bacon. I happened to have thick cut and it worked out just fine.

Bacon wrapped avocado

I will be the first to tell you that I do not love avocado. But I will eat it. Once we ate at a diner that had avocado fries as an appetizer. It was a breaded and fried piece of avocado with dipping sauces. It was surprisingly delicious. Then on Pinterest I came across bacon wrapped avocado. Hmm... that could be tasty! I tried out the recipe the other day and it was an enjoyable culinary experience. You can view the original recipe on Oh, Sweet Basil.

Bacon Wrapped Avocado

Ingredients
Bacon
1 Avocado
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 to 1 t chili powder

Directions
Heat the oven to 425 degrees.

In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar and chili powder. Set aside.

Line a baking sheet with foil (or be prepared to do a bit of scrubbing afterward).

Cut open the avocado and remove the pit. Slice about 3/4 inch slices lengthwise through the avocado and then cut in half width-wise. I made 4 cuts lengthwise giving me 8 chunks of avocado per side...16 chunks total. Cut each slice of bacon to wrap around each chunk of avocado. I just cut each slice in half, but you could cut in thirds to make your bacon go farther. Wrap the bacon piece around the avocado chunk. Roll in the brown sugar mixture and place on baking sheet. I had a bunch of the brown sugar mixture leftover after rolling all my pieces so I spooned the rest on top of each chunk before baking.

Bake for 10-15 minutes. Remove from the oven. I put mine on some paper towels to soak up some of the bacon grease before transferring to a pretty plate.