Family Dinner: Meatloaf

Meatloaf is a quintessential family dinner. There are a million ways to make it, and I've tried plenty of them. From what I've learned, meatloaf needs three basic ingredients: meat, eggs, breadcrumbs. On top of that are plenty of variations. So here's one I just made the other day.

Ingredients
1 lb. ground beef
1 lb. ground pork
2 eggs
1 cup Italian breadcrumbs
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp cumin
1 cup ketchup or barbecue sauce

Mix all the ingredients except ketchup in a large bowl. Spray a 13"x9" baking pan with cooking spray. Form the meat mixture into a loaf in the pan. Bake in a 375-degree oven for 45 minutes. Remove. Increase the oven temperature to 400. Brush the top of the meatloaf with ketchup. Return to the oven for 15 minutes or until the meat is fully cooked to 160 degrees. Let rest for 5-10 minutes before slicing and serving. I like mine with more ketchup.

 

Among the variations you can try, make it with ground turkey, or top with beef or mushroom gravy. Try adding some grated parmesan cheese to the mix. This is a great dish to experiment with, especially the seasonings you add. Try different combinations and see what you like best.

Pumpkin Spice Cookies

Several years ago, a friend of my wife came to visit in the fall, and brought these delicious soft pumpkin cookies. Since then, they've become a staple of autumn in our house, and while cans of pumpkin care readily available and likely on sale in your neighborhood grocery store, now is the perfect time to bake some up.

If you're not much of a baker, don't worry. This recipe is hard to mess up. Just keep an eye on the cookies and take them out just as you think they're getting done. They'll cook a little more as they cool.

You can find the basic recipe for these by searching for "Old fashioned pumpkin cookies," but here's my modified recipe that adds a little more spice.

Ingredients

3 cups flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. allspice

1 tsp. ground cloves

1 tsp. ground ginger

1/2 c. soft butter

1 1/2 c. sugar

1 15 oz can solid pack pumpkin

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 c. mini chocolate chips

In medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder and soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg allspice, cloves, ginger; set aside. With mixer cream butter and sugar in large bowl. Add pumpkin, egg and vanilla; beat until light and creamy. Add dry ingredients gradually; mix well. Fold in chocolate chips. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto greased cookie sheets. Bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes, or until light brown.

The cookies should have a firm, almost crusty outside, and a soft but firm (read: cooked) inside. They go great dunked in a glass of milk.

Feel free to add more or less of any of the spices depending on your taste. We decided during a family reunion a couple years ago to spice them up. You can also use pumpkin pie spice instead of the individual spices.

The recipe makes about three dozen cookies, so you'll have plenty for a while. Most of the recipes you'll find online include drizzling a simple icing over them finished products. Try it if you like, but we find the basic cookie is good enough!

Uncle Scott Salad

I started cooking when I was about eight or 10 years old, I guess. I asked my mom to teach me how to make scrambled eggs so I wouldn't have to wake her up on weekend mornings to make me breakfast. From there, my love of cooking evolved.

I'm no expert, but I take a great deal of pride in my cooking, and I've received many compliments. I've also usually been one of the best cooks I know. So of course, I wind up marrying a woman who's brother is a professional chef.

Truth is, it's been a great thing. My brother-in-law Scott has taught me a lot in the kitchen. Ironically, at holidays, I do most of the cooking for a couple of reasons. First, Scott's usually working, and secondly, people don't ask me to do TV shows on the holidays, so why should he have to spend the whole day cooking, right? But he usually arrives just in time to help me with that last-minute rush to get everything done and make sure the turkey is cooked.

Anyway... a lot of what Scott makes is, at least for now, a little above the subject matter of this blog. But there is one recipe of his that is incredibly simple and that we ask him to make when he comes to dinner at our house: Uncle Scott Salad.

Here's how simple it is: Get a bag of salad mix at the grocery store. Scott uses the one with lettuce, carrots and some cabbage. Dump it in a big bowl. He tops it with croutons, red onion slices, tomatoes and roasted sunflower seeds. Dish it out into smaller bowls and top it with your favorite dressing. That's it.

Of course, you can add in your personal favorite salad toppings, like the mushrooms I added to the salad above.

I know it's not much of a recipe, but it's really good, and let's face it: We could all use a little more salad in our diets, right?