Easy Ground Beef #4 – Mini Meatloaves

To make these little loaves you’ll need ground beef, salsa, cheese, a box of stuffing mix, chili powder, and water. Now, I am normally an oatmeal in my meatloaf kind of girl. I just like oats. I try to put them in everything I can. I think oats in meatloaf make it taste the best……but I will admit that the stuffing gives it a nice flavor and helps them stick together very well. So maybe now I’m an oatmeal AND stuffing kind of girl. I’m open to change…..sometimes.

You’re going to use 12 muffin cups. I had a large 12 cup pan, but I decided to go with two 6 cup pans instead. I thought they would be easier to wash. My big pan won’t fit down in the water, so I use it when I’m using paper muffin cup thingies and have less mess. Spray the heck out of your pans with cooking spray. I mean really lay it on. You don’t want the little loaves to stick…..plus it makes the pans easier to wash.

Ok, so you have your meat in a large mixing bowl – now add the stuffing, the water, and chili powder. This is my meatloaf bowl. Yes, I have a bowl dedicated to mixing meatloaf. I’m a strange cookie. I also have a cup dedicated to peanuts. What’s it to ya?

Mix it up buttercup! You can use a spoon…..if you’re a pansy. I like to use my hands. When I do, I know it’s totally mixed together. Plus, it goes a lot faster than trying to use a spoon. It’s a good idea to clip your fingernails before mixing it with your hands though – or you’ll be picking out meat from your fingernails for at least three days. I always keep my nails clipped short……I don’t like picking food out. Here’s a tip from my Mama – you can mix meatloaf in your stand mixer! Mama has rheumatoid arthritis, so her hands need a break from all this meatloaf mixing. If you decide to do this, do not mix it for long. ONLY MIX UNTIL COMBINED. If you go hog wild and let it mix forever, then you’ll have doorstop meatloaf like I was describing before.

Divide the mixture into 12 cups. I just eye-balled it, but you could use a cookie scoop if you wanted. It’s not an exact science, but they do need to be sorta the same…….you don’t want some done and some raw in the middle. Ew.

Take a spoon and push it down into the middle of the cup, like so. You’re trying to make a little indention in the center, sorta like a meatloaf volcano. Kids would love this part! If you get them involved in the cooking process, they’re more likely to eat it – or so I read in Parents magazine.

Fill the indentions you made with salsa. You could use something different if you wanted. If you had spaghetti or pizza sauce, you could use that instead. Whatever floats your boat! Salsa floats my boat…….but not as much as my friend Penny. I think she lives at the Mexican Restaurant.

Ok, let’s stop and have a little lesson. Do you buy your cheese already grated? I did…..until I wised up. You can get an 8 ounce block of cheese or an 8 ounce bag of shredded cheese for the same price. It’s the same weight, so it yields the same……right? Nope. When you grate a block of cheese, it will yield more volume than a bag of pre-shredded. Why? It comes out fluffier. You’ll use less and get more bang for your buck! Plus, pre-shredded cheese is coated with cornstarch and other preservatives to keep the strands separated. When you grate your own cheese, it won’t have that on there and plus, it melts prettier. I just like pretty melted cheese…..and money in my pocket.

Pop your loaves into the oven to bake for 30 minutes. That’s another plus with this recipe. It takes WAY less time…..about half. A regular meatloaf needs to bake for one hour or more. If you’re short on time, this is definitely the way to go! When the 30 minutes are up, pull out your pans and top the loaves with cheese. Put them back into the oven for about 5 minutes or until the cheese melts. Sorry for the blurry quality of some of these photos. Annie was interested in the meatloaf, so she was on my hip…..hard to hold the camera steady.

Here they are. Oh man, they were delicious and so moist! They didn’t even need ketchup, but we used it anyway. We’re a ketchup kind of household. Even Annie liked these…..well, she liked them last night, but who knows about today. That girl is as fickle as her mama.