Day 17: Honest Meat Loaf and Mashed Potatoes

I love meatloaf!  My mom would layer ketchup on the top, and put little surprises inside like whole hard boiled eggs and it looked so pretty on your plate.  I mean come on people!  That's some good eating!  Sometimes mom would experiment, and put a pocket of sauteed onions and mushrooms in the middle of the meatloaf.  That was a bit of a let down since I was a kid, and my love of onions had not yet blossomed.  Oh, and the mushrooms -- now I loved fresh  mushrooms then, and I love them now.  My mom used canned mushrooms which I definitely didn't like.  Of course this was the 70s after all, I mean didn't they use canned everything?  My mom considers me to be a bit of a snob when it comes to canned goods since I won't use canned peas, corn, beans, mushrooms...you get the pictures.  I would think she would change her mind since I use canned tomatoes, beets, and artichokes but sadly, no, it has not.  But I digress.

I love meatloaf, and meatloaf  and mashed potatoes, well, is there a more perfect combination?  I sort of used the mashed potato recipe listed with the roast chicken recipe found here, but I just couldn't bring myself to put 6 tablespoons of butter and 1/4 cup of olive oil in my mashed potatoes.  I used 3 tablespoons of butter, and believe me that was more than enough for us!

I've made meatloaf in the past without much success, probably because I was too stubborn to use a recipe.  I mean who needs a recipe?  A pound of hamburger, an egg, some bread crumbs, salt, pepper, garlic and onion powder, and it's meatloaf, right?  Well, not in my case -- my meatloaf was always dry, crumbly, and rather tasteless.

I loved the recipe for Honest Meat Loaf in Healthy Cooking for Two.  Delicious and moist, it was so good!  Now if only it called for a hard boiled egg in the middle it would have ranked right up there with my mom's.

Honest Meat Loaf
Healthy Cooking for Two (or just you)
Yield:  4 servings

1 pound extra-lean ground beef
1/2 cup fresh bread crumbs
1 egg
1 tsp dried basil or oregano
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 small onion, coarsely chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
4 sprigs fresh parsley

Preheat the oven to 350

     In a medium mixing bowl, combine the beef, bread crumbs, egg white (or whole egg), basil or oregano, salt and pepper.
     In a blender, combine the ketchup, lemon juice, onions, garlic and parsley; process until the onions and parsley are coarsely pureed.  Add the  mixture to the ingredients in the mixing bowl.  Knead the mixture lightly by hand until blended.
     Form and pat into a loaf shape in a shallow baking pan.  Bake for 40 to 50 minutes, or until the loaf is browned on top and cooked throughout.  Let rest for 10 minutes before slicing.

Tomorrow night:  Pizzoccheri and Cucumber, Feta with Red Onion and Mint Salad.