THE MEATLOAF EXPERIMENT

I keep telling myself that “I make good food, I need to find someone to make crappy food for me.” 

That’s more of a rationalization of the fact that I’m mentally incapable of not trying to zazz things up with whatever ingredients I may have handy. Now, if asked politely I can make pretty decent schnitzel or spaghetti and meatballs, but if left to my own devices I wind up sort of haphazardly tossing ingredients into the mix in the name of experimentation - The next ingredient will fit together and be my next culinary epiphany and make me millions of dollars and win me fan girls across oceans. Today I decided to make Meatloaf. A few weeks ago I decided to make German Meatballs, so I thought I would adapt elements of that recipe to make the meatloaf. It didn’t quite work exactly - kinda sorta because I was missing half the initial ingredients - I didn’t have any bell peppers, or bread crumbs, or bacon. All I had was ground pork, ground beef, onion, eggs, and a host of other random ingredients culled from my pantry (All-Bran, Tabasco Sauce, Balsamic Vinegar, and Worcestershire Sauce) All well, in my mind it seemed like enough!

So the initial recipe, which I pulled off the internets is viewable here:

http://www.tasty-german-recipe.com/best-meatball-recipe.html

I’ll post in a couple of days the best way to browse for recipes on the internet, but for right now allow me to continue:

When I initially made these I added some Diced Jalapeno, it came out rather well.

So, today I was looking for something to dinner and I realized I had some ground meat, so I thought “Hey, Meatloaf!”

So what I wound up making based off of what was in-house was this:

IMPROVISED MEATLOAF:

Ingredients:
8 oz. Ground Pork
6 oz. Ground Beef
2 TBSP Small Diced Onion
1 TSP Tabasco Sauce
1 TSP Balsamic Vinegar
1 TSP Worcestershire Sauce
1 TBSP Whole Grain Mustard
1 Cup All-Bran
To Taste Salt & Pepper
2 Hard-Boiled Eggs, peeled.

The Process:
1) Grind the All Bran into crumbs.
2) Mix all the ingredients (except the Eggs) together until well combined.
3) Wrap the Meat Mixture around the Eggs. Do this by laying the Meat out flat on a clean surface, placing the eggs in the middle, and folding the remainder of the meat out over the eggs.
4) Bake the Meatloaf at 350 degrees for about half an hour, reduce to 200 degrees for another 15 minutes and to hold.

How this actually came out, however, was a bit different. First off, I decided to eye-ball the measurements I came up with for myself. (not a good suggestion if you’re ever planning to remember how exactly you made something, just… for the record) secondly, I didn’t bother to include any raw egg in the mixture - which meant the meatloaf didn’t exactly bind as well as it could have (although the Mustard was meant to help that a bit, it didn’t work quite as well as I was hoping)

So, I wound up pouring a bit too much vinegar into the meatloaf, and wound up topping that with mustard. Now, since I used Balsamic Vinegar it made the meatloaf a bit too sweet. I thought the hot sauce would counter this and make a nice balsamic-pepper blend. I completely forgot that I kind of sort of hate balsamic vinegar with a fiery passion, but It was what I had so I thought to myself I thought “Well, fuck it, I’ll try it.” So, basically, I wound up with sweet and sour meatballs. Which I then gave to my girlfriend who’s not a particularly big fan of vinegar… so yeah, about that: she wasn’t a particular fan. I don’t think she’s actually spit out anything I’ve made before… I’ll let you figure out what she did this time, though.

Myself, I thought they did have a bit too much Balsamic Vinegar in it - and I’m not really a fan, but I did wind up eating it, because, well, I have no one else to blame but myself. Besides, It’s not like the time I put whole capers in an otherwise fruity couscous. (That I actually wound up having to throw away after 3 bites)

So, that’s what I did today. I wound up making Julie crepes to make up for me going a bit haywire on the experimental side.

Anyway, now I’m watching T.V.