meatloaf

It's not that I have any great secrets for this popular meat and potatoes meal...but there's a couple of stories that go with it:

Druggy's first meal at my parents' house - meatloaf.

Some ingredients known to be found in my dad's meatloaf recipes - carrots and/or raisins.

And here's a 'full story version' of one...

A few years ago, when Druggy and I were living close to my elderly grandparents, we gifted them meals with our family (we were aiming for 26 - every other week, but I think we maybe got to 10!). We would pack up all the ingredients and the kids and head over to their house to cook dinner with them...often on a Sunday night. I used this time to try out some new recipes and to cook things that I knew they both liked, but didn't have the ability to make for themselves anymore. One of those things was meatloaf. I was talking to my Aunt prior to that meal to get the low-down on my grandfather's preferences (cause you may not know this, but um...our family can maybe have a bit of a "we're particular - meaning obsessive compulsive" kind of streak in us). So before making the meatloaf, I needed to confer with an elder.

She told me two things. One I now abide by in all my ground meat cooking - only use ground sirloin. My grandfather would accept nothing less...and let me tell you, I now know why. I can't go back to using anything else. Second thing was to leave the leftovers so that my grandfather would be able to enjoy a cold meatloaf sandwich on a future day. The thought of this made me shudder, but who's to argue with childhood favorites.

So tonight's recipe/dinner is meat and potatoes - Meatloaf and Pierogies

Here's how I started:

Can you see all my cheaters for this meal? The Italian bread crumbs - not that making bread crumbs, or chunks for that matter, is hard...but I buy one of these tubes and can use it for loads of things and it lasts me awhile. So that's what I use. The critical element in my meatloaf, mini-meatloaves, and meatballs is the Lipton Beefy Onion seasoning. I use the meatloaf recipe on the back and we love it. Tonight's dinner also resulted in today's KQOTD from Yahoo #2:

I love meatloaf.
I want to marry it.
And then we can have babies.
And they'd be small.
And then I could EAT them!

So I follow the recipe on the Lipton seasoning. Sometimes I make one loaf. Sometimes I make mini-loaves, or meatballs. Tonight was mini-loaves, which I bake in my Pampered Chef mini-loaf stoneware. Very convenient for making mini-loaves. Mash all the ingredients together and cook it at 350 degrees until it's done...my meatballs take about 20 minutes, the mini-loaves about 30-35 and the 'whole loaf' would take about 50 minutes.

Next comes the pierogies. I fell in love with pierogies in college. In my now post-college life, I had to find a way to satisfy that craving. I've found that this frozen-food section brand is my favorite - oh, and look at that nice graphic on the box - PERFECT!

Now, it has been mentioned to me that I probably shouldn't label any of these meals as healthy - because really, I am still using a quite a bit of processed food. Then, when I went to prepare tonight's pierogies, I realized that I should probably second that motion - as I flopped the four pats of real butter down in the pan to saute these puppies up in.

I think the pierogies make a great potato side dish alternative, instead of the usual mashed (from a box, of course) or any one of the variety of 'frozen potatoes' we indulge in - fries, tater tots, mini-tater tots, crispy crowns, zesties, crunchies, crinkle...well, you get the point. I serve these with a dollop of sour cream.

I threw some steamed broccoli on the plate for tonight's veggie. Voila, another fast and easy dinner. And at least the reduced fat content in the ground sirloin balances sauteing the pierogies in butter, right?

meat and gravy...yum!

In the early years of my marriage, when I only had ONE child (and I don't even remember what THAT was like!), we lived just under a half an hour away from my parents. My mom retired right before Yahoo #1 was born and so she capitalized on our proximity by having weekly "Grammie Days". It saved me a day of running a Yahoo to day care, and gave Grammie and Yahoo a great opportunity to run around town. Often their trips included the breakfast buffet at Big Boy and then a trip to the local library for story time. It was during these Grammie days that #1 Yahoo grew to love sausage gravy. She loves it so much she eats a bowl of it for 'dessert' after breakfast. So, what loving mother wouldn't try to learn to duplicate said gravy? I tried, once, to make sausage gravy from scratch. It's not that it was too hard, it was that the amount of work didn't result in the flavor I wanted...had it been spectular, I would have made it again. Alas, it was not.

Then we spent a weekend at my parents house and the secret was revealed. My mom found the easy way to make it.

Here's my recipe for "As Good as Big Boy's Sausage Gravy"

Pick up this bag of gravy mix from GFS Marketplace (that's Gordon's Food Service).
Follow the directions on the bag.


I add browned Bob Evans breakfast sausage to this. Thus the SAUSAGE gravy. I usually buy one tube and cut it in half and save one half for future use in the freezer. I also do this with their Mild Italian Sausage which I use in my calzones and pasta bakes.


Now, are biscuits hard to make? No.
If you make them with Bisquick are they even easier? Yes.
What's the easiest way to make biscuits? Open a tube. One tube of 8 Grands biscuits is more than enough for one breakfast with our Yahoos, with a few left over for um...leftovers.

There you have it. It was consumed so rapidly that I don't have a glorious, tantalizing picture of the finished product. Suffice it to say, however, that Yahoo said it was as good as Big Boy's.