Montrio Bistro I Tony Baker

Grilled Peaches And Burrata

It’s difficult to focus when Montrio Bistro’s 48-hour bacon is delivered to your table. And yet, there’s another option on their current “Medium Plates” menu capable of distracting your gaze from that rich slab of pork.

It’s a simple arrangement, just some halved slices of peach and a few seeping rounds of burrata. Chef Tony Baker touches the fruit to a grill only long enough to dig a few acrid scars. The texture remains firm and ripe, with a genteel—almost elegant—sweetness.

But the fine, ragged black lines drawn by the grill seem at odds with the peach, mineralic with a salt and pepper hue—the essence of well-seasoned iron and the raw scraping of heat. That is until paired with burrata.

Creamy and mellow in nature, the delicate cheese drapes over the fruit, soothing its wounds. Blackened streaks soften into something like toffee dotted with flecks of sea salt. The fresh peach takes on a candied note. The result is like that moment of joyous leisure when you dip a spoon into pot de créme. The plate is a peach-scented, finespun salted caramel wonder.

While this dish is on the menu, you may forget about that beautiful bacon.

MONTRIO BISTRO 414 Calle Principal, Monterey. 648-8880, montrio.com