There is only one thing wrong with this recipe – based on Mary Beth Albright’s tasty revelation on Food Network’s ‘Next Star’ program a few years ago – and that is that it make a heckuva big meatloaf.
I’ve made this meatloaf with a differing combination of meats, from ground beef and turkey, to all ground beef, to ground beef and lamb, to… this version, which is equal parts ground beef and pork, and it is all good, if a bit large for a household of two, but hang on, I may have a fix for that…
INGREDIENTS
Meatloaf:
•1 lb ground beef
•1 lb ground pork
•2 cups panko crumbs
•2 cups buttermilk
•1 tsp dried parsley
•1 tsp paprika
•1 tsp dry mustard
•1 tsp seasoned salt
•1/2 tsp granulated garlic
•1/2 tsp Cajun Power Spicy Garlic Sauce – or your favorite hot sauce
•Canola oil
•3-4 cups chopped veggies:
•2 cloves garlic, diced
•4 celery stalks, diced
•1 onion, diced
•1/2 green pepper, diced
•1 or 2 red, yellow or orange peppers, diced
•3 carrots, diced
Glaze:
•3/4 cup barbecue sauce
•1/4 cup ‘sup! – or ketchup
•1/4 cup yellow mustard
Tip: if you don’t keep buttermilk on hand, and/or don’t want to buy a bottle for just one recipe (tho’ it is awfully good for marinating chicken and chops before grilling), you can easily make your own at home by placing one tablespoon of fresh lemon juice or white vinegar for each cup of buttermilk needed in the bottom of a measuring cup, and then filling to the mark with milk – whole, 2%, skim, it all works – giving it a stir, and then letting it rest for five or ten minutes. Voila, buttermilk!
First – well, assuming you’ve well and truly dealt with the buttermilk issue – let’s make the glaze by combining the ‘sup!, barbecue sauce, and mustard in a container and setting it aside until needed.
Next, combine the panko crumbs with the dried parsley, paprika, mustard powder, seasoned salt, and garlic powder in a bowl and then stir in the buttermilk. Let the mixture rest while you move on to the veggies.
Heat your oven to 375º.
Heat a tablespoon of canola oil in a large pan over medium-high heat, then add the prepared veggies and sauté for about ten minutes, until the veggies are tender, but still brightly colored. Remove from the heat and let cool.
At this point, especially if this was going to be meatballs, I would normally pop the cooked veggies into the food processor and pulse them three or four times to get a finely chopped veggie pulp, but I feeling lazy, so just used them as is.
Add the now well-soaked panko crumbs to the cooled veggie mixture along with two tablespoons of the glaze mixture and stir to combine well.
Add this mixture to the gound beef and pork in a large bowl and mix – there really is no better way to do this – with your hands until nicely blended. Pack this mixture into a loaf pan, then turn out onto a foil-lined, rimmed baking pan.
Pop into the oven for twenty minutes, then pull out and brush the top and sides with some of the remaining glaze mixture.
Bake for another hour, brushing with additional glaze every 20 minutes, then remove for the oven and let rest for 15 minutes before serving.
Meatloaf, done – and tasty, too!
But…
this is a honking big loaf o’ meat for just two folk, and there is a limit to how often one wants to sit down to a dinner of even so fine and tasty a meatloaf as this.
What to do?
A few years back, I served my sister-in-law an ill-conceived dinner of meatloaf quesadilla while the hubbies were at a concert.
It did not go over well, but, I’ve been thinkin’ about it, and I believe I now know where I went wrong.
Meatloaf Quesadillas:
•Thinly sliced meatloaf
•Thinly sliced cheese (I used Velveeta)
•Hot jalapeño nacho slices
•Flour tortillas
Thanks to my mom and dad-in-law, we are the proud owners of a quesadilla maker, which makes whipping up these treats wicked simple. If your are not so blessed (with in-laws and/or quesadilla maker), check the notes in yesterday’s post for quesadilla-making in a skillet. Still pretty simple to make, you just won’t have those cool wedge marks once the quesadilla is done.
Heat your oven to 225º.
Arrange the meatloaf, cheese, and jalapeño nacho slices in the center of a flour tortilla, taking care to leave a fare amount of room around the edges. You also do not want to pile stuff up too high here – you want to be able to close the quesadilla maker, or, if using a skillet, heat everything through fairly quickly.
Top with another flour tortilla, pop into the quesadilla maker and close the lid.
Three or four minutes, then, presto! I was pretty careful about not filling mine too thickly, and stuff still kinda oozed out in spots. Still, there’s nothing wrong with a bit of slightly charred cheese.
Transfer the quesadilla to a rack and stash in the oven to keep warm while you make the rest of your quesadillas – I find that three is just about right for us for dinner, mebbe five or six as munchies for a crowd.
What a nice use of leftover meatloaf!
The quesadillas were quite nice on their own, but Rich had picked up a bottle of bacon ranch mayonnaise that added a little sumpin’ sumpin’.
Leftovers that don’t feel like leftovers…
I like that in a dinner.