Mama’s Meatloaf

One of my favorite meals from childhood was my mother’s meatloaf. My mama is a very talented cook and baker, if I do say so. She can probably make anything taste delicious. The only difficult thing about my mother’s recipes is that they’re all in her head. So when I asked her for her meatloaf recipe, this is what I got:

My meatloaf recipe –
essentially throw in a raw egg or two to the ground beef (about a pound)and some Italian bread crumbs (progresso is what I usually use) salt, pepper. Squish it all up with your hands so that it is well mixed and holds together. Shape it into a loaf and put into a baking dish, squeeze some ketchup on the top ( I usually do a fat stripe) and there you have it! Oh, don’t forget to chop some onion up and put that in too.
Hope YOU are having a good week too! XXX

Um. Okay. How many eggs? About a pound?  Some breadcrumbs? What does that mean exactly? Anyway. I decided to experiment to attempt to actually quantify her recipe while also making it gluten/grain free. In the place of the Italian breadcrumbs, I used some almond meal and garlic powder, which gave it the flavor that I remember from days of yore.

Mama’s Meatloaf

Ingredients:

1 pound ground meats (I used turkey because that’s what we had on hand,

but I think the recipe might be tastier with ground beef.)

1 egg

1/4 cup almond meal

1 Tbsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp sea salt

Ketchup ( I used Trader Joe’s Organic Ketchup)

Sprinkle of oregano

First, I chopped the onions. I didn’t try too hard, because I like chunks of onion in my meatloaf.

Then, I mixed everything together in a bowl and squished it around with my hands to make sure it was thoroughly mixed.  I formed it into a loaf and placed in a pyrex baking dish.

I topped with ketchup and put it in the oven at 400 degrees for an hour. The kitchen smelled like hot ketchup and onions, which is exactly what I used to smell when my mama made meatloaf.

The end result was pretty darn close to what I remember. I’m not sure what that white leakage is…but I ignored it and dug in.

I find it’s best with lots of ketchup and sweet potato fries!