Ingredients:
2 lbs 90-93% lean ground beef
2 hot dog rolls, torn into tiny pieces
1 egg, beaten
1 small onion, diced
1 carrot, small dice
1 stalk celery, small dice
1 tablespoon Worchestershire sauce
salt
freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup chili sauce (like Heinz)
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400. In a large bowl, mix together the beef, egg, rolls, onion, carrot, celery, and spices. Form into a loaf. Place in a loaf pan (or, preferably, a meatloaf pan). Brush the top with the chili sauce to coat. Bake for 40 minutes or until fully cooked. Wait a few minutes before slicing for best results.
My thoughts:
To be honest, I didn’t want to make dinner today. In fact, I was sort of hoping the ground beef was spoiled so I’d have an excuse to not make dinner. I didn’t have a plan on how to use it but since I had 2 lbs of it (normally I buy the 1 lb packages but the store was out) I thought I might as well make meatloaf and use it all up at once. I read a post about meatloaf in some e-newsletter that mentioned celery as being a “typical” meatloaf ingredient. That didn’t sound right to me but whatever, I had some so I tossed some in my new chopper along with some carrot chunks and tossed it in the mix. I had some squished hot dog rolls so I used them instead of slices sandwich bread as the binder. They were soft and melted right into the meat mixture. I loathe tomato ketchup (I only like ketchup made from fruit or other vegetables lol) so I always use chili sauce on mine which is like ketchup’s less sweet, less coying, zestier cousin. I really slather it on so it seals the meatloaf so doesn’t dry out while the pan takes care of any extra grease. Anyway! I am glad I went ahead and made the meatloaf, it came out really good! Tender, juicy and full of flavor. I’m glad I added the celery, I think it added some moisture and flavor without being overpowering or watery. It made a good meatloaf sandwich too. So, if you are in the mood for a classic meatloaf with a little extra veggies, try this one. You won’t be disappointed.
I recently had a craving for a meatloaf sandwich, which required making a meatloaf. Since it had been years since I made one I checked the web for recipes mainly to get the ratios of bread/crackers and eggs to the amount of meat. I can tell you from a extensive search that the majority of recipes I found contained celery and carrots. The reason my search was extensive was because I am not particularly fond of celery in any form (cooked or raw)or cooked carrots. Hence, my search for recipes that did not contain either celery or carrots was ended up very, very hard to find. I know the aforementioned veggies add a lot of flavor so I ended up chopping a bit of both VERY fine.
How interesting! Well, I have a lot of non-celery meatloaf recipes here if you are interested!