comfort food

The weather has shifted cooler and it’s time to start cooking comfort food. I was in the mood for the ultimate comfort food, meatloaf.  While I do have several meat loaf recipes, I wanted something new and I found one that was created by American’s Test Kitchen, Ketchup-Brown Sugar Glazed Turkey Meatloaf. ATK developed this recipe as cooks were swapping ground beef for ground turkey and finding the turkey meatloaf was solid like a brick. Swapping beef for turkey requires adjusting your recipe to take into account the lack of fat in ground turkey. 

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With this in mind, ATK’s recipe contains quick oats, which help lighten the texture. Another tip I picked up was adding a pinch of baking soda to sautéing onions which helps them to breakdown faster. Also, in the mixture is garlic, fresh thyme, Worcestershire sauce, egg yolks, Dijon mustard, Parmesan cheese and salt and pepper.  Another tip I learned was that adding cornstarch to the oatmeal before it goes into the ground turkey helps to capture any moisture in the meat loaf.

Another plus to this recipe was the delicious glaze that goes over the meatloaf both before and midway through cooking. The glaze is ketchup based brown sugar, cider vinegar and a bit of hot sauce for that certain je ne sais quoi. The meatloaf bakes for approximately one hour.

What a delicious meatloaf. The glaze was very flavorful and added a bit of zing to the dish. It takes about 30 minutes to prepare, but if you’re lucky, you’ll have leftovers to enjoy in a sandwich the next day.