Monday, July 12, 2010

Sunday Dinner: Meat Loaf

I know the menu seems rather wintry for July, but we had a rainy almost-cool day on Saturday.  Plus, I'm not sure I've ever made meatloaf before!  I found a recipe in a Mennonite cookbook that called for surrounding a meatloaf with green beans and sliced potatoes, with cream of mushroom soup poured over the vegetables.  I didn't have room in the slowcooker for all that, so I just steamed the green beans (and put brown butter on them, you know).  I skipped the mushroom soup, too, and just oiled the sliced potatoes.  I thought the meatloaf was fine, not amazing:  it called for tomato juice, cracker crumbs, chopped onion, eggs, salt and pepper and I added a little Worcestershire sauce.  Any advice or favorite meatloaf recipes for me?  I think this is an area I want to explore and I have plenty of ground beef in the freezer to experiment with.

Menu
meatloaf with potatoes
green beans
German slaw
kombucha
zucchini cake with chocolate on top
coffee

Saturday: 
put ground beef in fridge to thaw
bake zucchini cake
top and tail green beans
crush crackers for meat loaf
whiz a quart of canned tomatoes into juice
used another cabbage to make another batch of German slaw

Sunday morning:
mixed up meat loaf - put in slow cooker with potatoes; turn on high
set green beans in pot

Sunday noon:
set table (with many helping hands)
cook green beans
make coffee


We shared this meal with dear friends who needed a lift before their moving day this week.  I know that made it more delicious.

7 comments:

Laura said...

We eat meat loaf often because it's a family favorite! Our basic recipe - so basic that even the 12-yr-old can make it - is this:

3 lbs gr. beef
2 c. oats
1 T. garlic, minced
6 eggs
1 T. dried parsley
salt
a pinch of cayenne pepper

Mix all ingredients together. Press into rectangular casserole dish. Bake @ 375 for about 45 minutes.

We eat the leftovers sliced thinly on toasted bread for sandwiches the next day.

Margo said...

Thank you, Laura! I hope meatloaf becomes our family favorite too, because it really is easy and a classic comfort food.

Deanna Beth said...

I notice your friend's recipe above doesn't have any tomato products in it. Huh. I thought they all did. My mother made meatloaf once when I was at home and my husband came a-courting for a family meal. She replaced the tomato sauce that her recipe called for with a jar of her whole, home-canned tomatoes. At the time, I probably thought it was embarassingly homespun. But Michael still talks about that as being the best meatloaf he ever had and his glee at finding big chunks of tomato right in the meatloaf.

Margo said...

DB, what a great story!
I realized since I posted this that I have made a recipe from Simply in Season called Middle Eastern Meatloaf which is parsley, onions, beef, and spices. But yes, I think of traditional homey meatloaf the way you and Michael do.

Kay S. said...

My suggestion for meatloaf involves the size. I make individual sized meatloaves and they only require 20 minutes in a 475 degree oven. Maybe we like it because of the proportion of "crust" to interior. If I make a lot of them, they freeze beautifully!

Margo said...

Kay, are you using muffin tins or what size are you talking about? This is a good idea.

Kay S. said...

I kind of pat them into little free standing oblong loaves. I usually get about 8 of them with my recipe that uses 2 lbs of meat