We were grocery shopping today and Lloyd said, “I need to learn how to make meatloaf from scratch.” I told him, “It’s a method, not a recipe. You should make some for dinner.” He was game, so here is the documentation of Lloyd’s dinner, so he can recall it at a later date and make dinner again. 🙂
For meatloaf, you need: Meat, some sort of Bread Product, an Egg, Seasonings, Add-ins (purely optional, unless you’re making Lloyd’s Famous Meatloaf), and Topping Stuff (tomato-based). If you’d like to read a much-better-written article about this method, check here.
Preheat the cooking device to 350.
We bought some stuffing croutons, and Lloyd asked if he could use those for his Bread Product. I said ‘yes’, but he’d need to smash them up. Note: Lloyd, you could also use crushed crackers, oatmeal, breadcrumbs. Use about 3/4 a cup. Whatever.
Cut up half an onion. Lloyd did it himself! For a beautiful tutorial on this, visit here.
Add a tube of hamburger from your dad. (Lloyd’s dad raises cattle.) We used a little one-pounder. (If you use a two-pounder, double everything else.)
Cut up your add-ins. These can be anything you like – but don’t go too crazy.
Add an egg and some salt and pepper. (You used 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and a bunch of grinds of pepper.) If you want to put in other seasonings, now’s the time. (Our croutons were already seasoned.)
Smoosh it up and pat into a pan, or you could free-form this on a cookie sheet with raised edges and make it look like a dragon! You should do that next time! (Wait – the head and tail would burn before his tummy was done. Rats.)
Where were we? Oh, put it in a roaster on the kitchen floor and cook it at 350 for 20-30 minutes and then put your topping on. (You mixed ketchup and barbeque sauce – good call.)
Bake another 30 minutes or so or until it’s not pink inside (internal temperature of 160-170). Or better yet, don’t set the timer and keep playing your video game while your wife asks, “Is it almost done? It smells done.” Answer her, “It’s not done yet.” Keep attacking those zombies, and almost overcook it.
Way to go, Lloyd! I’m most impressed with how few dishes you used! Seriously, I kept getting bowls out for him but he just used the same dishes over and over – he’s going to be a much, much better cook than me if he keeps this up.
Brad says
I’m a big fan of recipes. For me, playing it by ear has led to some nasty concoctions. I’m afraid I’m not much of a food artist.
Peggy says
Way to go Chef Lloyd!!
I’d love to see you try this: Or maybe I will.
http://www.blackwidowbakery.com/demo/meatcake/
(and I seem to remember a joke from my kid years and the punch line is something like: It made the meat loaf. But I can’t remember the question. Does anyone out there no this joke?)
Deanne says
This is the best food item I’ve seen in a long time. I may have to make one.
Kristi says
Olives in your meat loaf? Now that’s a new one.
Lloyd says
A long time ago Hamburger Helper had a meatloaf meal, and I would use that to make my world famous meatloaf. One of the suggestions that they had was to add olives, celery and blueberries* to the recipe to jazz things up.
Luckily Lauren got home in time to tell me that they meant ONE of those items, not all three. I just avoided mixing everything together, and made three small meatloaves instead.
*okay, so maybe the third item wasn’t blueberries. But there definitely were three items, and I couldn’t think of a more plausible ingredient.
Lauren says
It was corn. He was about to turn meatloaf into 7-layer dip.
Lauren's mom says
How about green chilis or Wendy’s chili seasoning packet as the third possible addition.
Mmmm meatloaf! Now I’m hungry.
Christina says
You could make the dragon body of meatloaf and add a head and tail made of tin foil….that would be an awesome presentation….I could show it to Declan, then maybe he would want to make Crazy Uncle Lloyd’s Famous Meatloaf.
Annette says
And, I was just informed that the crumbs at the bottom of the toaster, collected for months before dumped, may also be used as already smashed croutons. Of course, not at my house….I dump the crumb tray after each use!
Lloyd, it looks delicsch!
Beth says
For real? After each use? I hope you don’t eat toast every day that would add up to hours of your life crumb dumping… 😉
Katie @ Kitchen Stewardship says
Love it! “It’s not a recipe. It’s a method.” You are hilarious with your comments and photos. 🙂 Katie