Recipe: Spicy Individual Meatloaves

You know what's really hard to do? Take an appetizing picture of meatloaf. Don't get me wrong. I love meatloaf. And this meatloaf was freakin' amazing. But meatloaf does not photograph well. :(

Ah well. Photographs aside, I am very proud to say that I came up with this recipe myself. The idea for individual meatloaves came from my lovely aunt (thanks!), and I thought it was brilliant, especially since I am currently living alone (not counting the dog, who I'm very certain wanted to be included in the guest list for tonight's dinner). There were 2 added bonuses of making small individual meatloaves: 1) it took way less time to cook, and 2) the leftovers can be wrapped and frozen individually for future meals. Woohoo!

The actual ingredients for these bites of savory goodness were more a result of what I happened to have on hand, so the recipe will be less precise than usual. No matter. Meatloaf is one of those very flexible dishes that you can flavour or spice however you want (within reason though, of course).

Your first step is, of course, to make a big gooey mess. Combine some ground beef, Italian sausage meat, thinly sliced onion, garlic, barbecue sauce, cracker crumbs and Worcestershire sauce and mix with you hands until everything is evenly combined.

Fill a muffin tray with the meat mixture and brush the tops of each with barbecue sauce. No need to grease the tray beforehand -- the beef would probably have enough juice on its own not to stick, but the sausage makes extra sure of that. Once the tray is full, simply fire it in the oven at 350F for 20 minutes, and presto! Mini meatloaves. They pop out of the muffin pan like a charm, leaving most of the fat behind in the bottom of each cup. It makes the pan a disgusting mess to deal with, but it means you avoid that nasty layer of squishy fat that you sometimes get on the bottom of meatloaf.

Serve with potatoes or rice, or whatever else strikes your fancy. Enjoy!

Here's the full recipe, but most of the measurements are approximate, so feel free to jimmy with them to suit your preferences:

Spicy Individual Meatloaves
Ingredients:
1 pkg lean ground beef
1/2 pkg spicy Italian sausage meat
1 onion, minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup barbecue sauce (+ however much you brush on top of each individual "loaf")
1 1/2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
10-15 crackers, crushed into fine crumbs
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions;
1. Preheat the oven to 350 F.

2. In a large bowl, mix together all ingredients until evenly combined.

3. Place an even amount of the meat mixture in each cup of a muffin tray. If you fill them really full, you may want to put a baking sheet under the muffin tray when you cook them to catch any juices that run off.

4. Brush each loaf with additional barbecue sauce.

5. Cook for 20 minutes, then remove from muffin tray, leaving behind the excess fat.