Meatloaf

When my hubby and I got married, and I told him I was making meatloaf, he said, "yuck!" I told him he hadn't had my meatloaf. :-) After he tasted it, he's requested it ever since, and it's a regular meal in our house. All of my kids LOVE this! Every time I make it, I say I need to make it more often because all of my kids gobble it up, it's easy to throw together, and I usually have most of the ingredients on hand already. I do make mine with ground turkey. I can taste a difference than ground beef but it's less greasy, healthier, and we really like it a lot!  The key ingredient in this meatloaf is Ritz crackers, the way my mom always made it. It really makes the meatloaf! :-)  See my note at the bottom about making these in muffin tins, the only way I make it anymore.

Ingredients
1 lb ground beef or turkey (choose lean ground beef or ground turkey for heart healthy)
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 yellow onion, minced (or use 1 Tbsp dried minced onion)
1 egg
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup ketchup
1 Tbsp Worcester sauce
1 roll of crushed Ritz crackers (use wheat Ritz for heart healthy)
Directions
Combine all ingredients well and shape into loaf (or see bottom for doing it in a muffin tin. Tips for crushing your crackers: I do it either in the food processor or take a gallon size freezer bag, put all the crackers in it, and use a rolling pin to smash the crackers. I also mix all of this with my hands, how my mom always made her meatloaf. :-) Put into a glass dish.  Cover and bake 1 hour at 350 degrees. I always smother the top of mine and my kids' slices with lots of ketchup. :-)
Variation: Make individual meatloaves in muffin tins. This is the only way I make my meatloaf now.  It's faster, easy, and I honestly think it tastes better because of texture. I wouldn't do this with a high fat meat because the fat will rise out of your tins. After you mix up the meat mixture, divide the meat out into muffin tins. Makes about 9-10 medium size mini loaves. Bake for 30 minutes only!

Hide your veggies: put a large handful of finely chopped spinach (I did mine in my food processor) in your meatloaf mix. I can't even tell the difference.

Egg-free: use one of my egg substitutions to the right if you need egg free. I prefer flax seed as my choice.