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Someone once told me they've never had a good low fat meatloaf...so I found one. This loaf packs a lot of flavor and is incredibly good as a cold sandwich the next day on crusty white bread with honey mustard and roasted red peppers (from a jar is fine).
I'll introduce a 'sweat cooking' method that helps you cook onions, peppers and the like without a lot of oil. You can do the sauteing in this with a spoon or two of oil, but thats 20+ grams of fat by itself.
In sweat cooking, use a medium high heat and a teflon pan. Keep a cup of water, wine, beer or stock handy...I use the roasted vegetable stock from trader joes. Put your sliced onions, garlic, whatever in the pan and add just a few teaspoons of the liquid, and start stirring. When the pan runs dry, add a few more teaspoons. If it starts sticking, turn down the heat a little. In about the same amount of time as it would take to cook the veggies in oil, they'll be done with this method with no fat involved, and still brown from the natural sugars in the veggies and liquid used.
In a skillet, saute by either method a half pound of chopped mushrooms and a chopped onion until brown...mushrooms have a lot of liquid in them inherently, so you'll need to use very little added liquid if using the sweat method. About 7 minutes.
Add to the pan 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg, 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/4 teaspoon hot pepper flakes or cayenne.
Those in some parts of the country just said "hey, thats Jerk seasoning!", and thats right. You could also buy a bottle of mccormacks or durkees dry jerk seasoning and use 2-4 teaspoons of that instead.
I get a jerk paste in a jar from Cost Plus World Market called "Walkerswood traditional jamaican jerk seasoning", and it kicks butt: this is the real deal. This is a more traditional jerk rub and has hotter than heck habanero's in it, so if you find this, only use a teaspoon. Some of this rubbed on chicken wings and/or a nice pork tenderloin and then put on the grill is a treat. I've made the paste by hand by pureeing a bunch of green onions, a scotch bonnet/habaneo or jalapeno pepper or two, and a tsp each of salt, black pepper, allspice, nutmeg, cinnamon and thyme.
The jerk seasoning is how we'll counteract the turkeys blandness in the meatloaf.
Add 3-4 tablespoons cider or white vinegar and 2-3 tablespoons mollasses to the pan. Scrape this around for a minute and then scrape it out into a large mixing bowl and let cool for 5-10 minutes. Add 1/2 cup all purpose flour and stir to mix.
Once the vegetable mix is cool, add 1.5 pounds of ground turkey or chicken, 1/2 cup chicken or vegetable stock, 1 large egg (or egg white if you're going lower fat), and the original recipe called for 3/4 cup pickled cocktail onions, but I've made it without and its fine.
Mix thoroughly.
Preheat the oven to 350 and break out the loaf pan, a 5x9ish loaf or bread pan will work, and lightly spray it with cooking spray. The original recipe calls for lining the pan with prosciutto slices, putting in the meat mixture, and then covering the top of the meat mix with more prosciutto. I've made it with and without, its tastier with it but I wouldnt make a special trip to the store and spend five bucks on the proscuitto unless you feel like it.
Cook for about 55-60 minutes, until the loaf just starts to shrink from the pan. Internal temp should be about 160 if you want to measure it with a probe.
Remove from the oven, let stand for 10-15 minutes, turn out onto a plate, slice and eat.
You can sprinkle a pinch of jerk seasoning over the loaf slices if you find on taste testing that you didnt add enough. A shot of Franks Louisiana Hot Sauce is also good.
Dont forget those sandwiches. The honey mustard makes it.
Made with 99% fat free turkey breast, the sweat method on the mushrooms, an egg white, vegetable stock, and minus the proscuitto, this is almost completely fat free. Even with 7% ground turkey, the whole egg, chicken stock and the ham, its still about 1/4 the fat of the average meatloaf.
I've also doubled the volume of mushrooms and halved the turkey once. The result was a little softer than a typical meatloaf...almost a pate consistency...but still good. I suppose you could compose this entirely of mushrooms and textured vegetable protein but I've never tried it.
I'll introduce a 'sweat cooking' method that helps you cook onions, peppers and the like without a lot of oil. You can do the sauteing in this with a spoon or two of oil, but thats 20+ grams of fat by itself.
In sweat cooking, use a medium high heat and a teflon pan. Keep a cup of water, wine, beer or stock handy...I use the roasted vegetable stock from trader joes. Put your sliced onions, garlic, whatever in the pan and add just a few teaspoons of the liquid, and start stirring. When the pan runs dry, add a few more teaspoons. If it starts sticking, turn down the heat a little. In about the same amount of time as it would take to cook the veggies in oil, they'll be done with this method with no fat involved, and still brown from the natural sugars in the veggies and liquid used.
In a skillet, saute by either method a half pound of chopped mushrooms and a chopped onion until brown...mushrooms have a lot of liquid in them inherently, so you'll need to use very little added liquid if using the sweat method. About 7 minutes.
Add to the pan 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg, 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/4 teaspoon hot pepper flakes or cayenne.
Those in some parts of the country just said "hey, thats Jerk seasoning!", and thats right. You could also buy a bottle of mccormacks or durkees dry jerk seasoning and use 2-4 teaspoons of that instead.
I get a jerk paste in a jar from Cost Plus World Market called "Walkerswood traditional jamaican jerk seasoning", and it kicks butt: this is the real deal. This is a more traditional jerk rub and has hotter than heck habanero's in it, so if you find this, only use a teaspoon. Some of this rubbed on chicken wings and/or a nice pork tenderloin and then put on the grill is a treat. I've made the paste by hand by pureeing a bunch of green onions, a scotch bonnet/habaneo or jalapeno pepper or two, and a tsp each of salt, black pepper, allspice, nutmeg, cinnamon and thyme.
The jerk seasoning is how we'll counteract the turkeys blandness in the meatloaf.
Add 3-4 tablespoons cider or white vinegar and 2-3 tablespoons mollasses to the pan. Scrape this around for a minute and then scrape it out into a large mixing bowl and let cool for 5-10 minutes. Add 1/2 cup all purpose flour and stir to mix.
Once the vegetable mix is cool, add 1.5 pounds of ground turkey or chicken, 1/2 cup chicken or vegetable stock, 1 large egg (or egg white if you're going lower fat), and the original recipe called for 3/4 cup pickled cocktail onions, but I've made it without and its fine.
Mix thoroughly.
Preheat the oven to 350 and break out the loaf pan, a 5x9ish loaf or bread pan will work, and lightly spray it with cooking spray. The original recipe calls for lining the pan with prosciutto slices, putting in the meat mixture, and then covering the top of the meat mix with more prosciutto. I've made it with and without, its tastier with it but I wouldnt make a special trip to the store and spend five bucks on the proscuitto unless you feel like it.
Cook for about 55-60 minutes, until the loaf just starts to shrink from the pan. Internal temp should be about 160 if you want to measure it with a probe.
Remove from the oven, let stand for 10-15 minutes, turn out onto a plate, slice and eat.
You can sprinkle a pinch of jerk seasoning over the loaf slices if you find on taste testing that you didnt add enough. A shot of Franks Louisiana Hot Sauce is also good.
Dont forget those sandwiches. The honey mustard makes it.
Made with 99% fat free turkey breast, the sweat method on the mushrooms, an egg white, vegetable stock, and minus the proscuitto, this is almost completely fat free. Even with 7% ground turkey, the whole egg, chicken stock and the ham, its still about 1/4 the fat of the average meatloaf.
I've also doubled the volume of mushrooms and halved the turkey once. The result was a little softer than a typical meatloaf...almost a pate consistency...but still good. I suppose you could compose this entirely of mushrooms and textured vegetable protein but I've never tried it.
