It rhymes with tradition, but also with creativity, with waste-free and economical cooking, and experimentation. Meatloaf is a dish that will never go out of style, because it can adapt over time to different needs, including those that require it to be made with ingredients other than meat, such as fish and vegetables. A true comfort food that even children love, often considered very simple to prepare: unfortunately, sometimes the result doesn't live up to the simple, soft, and juicy recipe it's described as: it's dry, flavorless, and falls apart. Yes, even the preparation of this rustic and familiar meatloaf can hide pitfalls: below, here are the most common mistakes and how to avoid them again.
1. Underestimating the Choice of Meat
The main ingredient in meatloaf is ground meat: the most classic is beef, with prime cuts ideal as they're both lean and tender. In reality, we know this recipe comes from a recycled kitchen, so it's pointless to "waste" a fillet. Second-rate cuts that are perfect for this recipe are shoulder and rump, which still remain tender when cooked and are cheaper. Furthermore, to prevent the meatloaf from drying out, it's helpful to mix lean and fatty meats, adding ground pork to the beef (or veal), which also adds more flavor. If you go to the butcher, have the butcher make a mixed mince on the spot, while if you opt for pre-packaged meats, it's convenient to use half and half. You can also make this recipe with white chicken and turkey.
2. Not Hydrating the Mixture
In addition to the meat, the meatloaf mixture contains ingredients that help make it more tender and compact: this means it doesn't dry out while cooking and doesn't fall apart when cut. Among the most valuable allies are: stale bread, soaked in a little milk and squeezed, so there's no excess liquid, and eggs, which soften and bind the different ingredients together. A trick to maintain internal moisture is to add a grated and carefully drained zucchini or carrot, as they help retain internal moisture, releasing their water, without altering the flavor. If you think the latter is lacking, Parmesan, Grana Padano, and Pecorino cheeses add more flavor, while nutmeg and aromatic herbs add flavor. With lean chicken and turkey, we suggest adding a fresh cheese such as ricotta, stracchino, or robiola to add moisture. The result should be a soft but compact mixture: if it is sticky or mushy, adjust with breadcrumbs.
3. Overdoing the Filling (If There's Any)
Many traditional meatloaves feature a chewy center or a rich filling with cheese—scamorza, provola, fontina—ham, mortadella, spinach, and mushrooms: tried-and-true combinations that add flavor and tenderness. The risk, in this case, is overdoing it, compromising the cooking process—some parts may remain raw—or causing the "structure" to collapse instead of holding it together. How to proceed? A very practical method is to lay out a sheet of parchment paper slightly larger than the rolled-out dough on the work surface, create a layer of filling, and then roll it up with the help of the parchment paper, forming a narrow cylinder.
4. Getting the Shape Wrong
Once you have the dough ready to the right consistency, transfer it to the center of a sheet of parchment paper and shape it first with your hands —which you can grease with oil to prevent the mixture from sticking—to give it the initial sausage shape, then finish by wrapping it completely in the parchment paper, creating a cylinder with a candy-like closure at the sides. If you have a filling, instead, roll it out to a thickness of about 3 cm and then proceed as in the previous step: in any case, the end result will be a fully lined meatloaf, but not compressed or squashed. For softer mixtures, such as chicken or turkey, it may help to let it firm up in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to an hour before cooking.
5. Knowing Only One Cooking Method
The enemy of meatloaf is haste: it's a dish that requires a medium-long cooking time, from 45 to 60 minutes depending on the size and filling. A great classic is to bake it in the oven: to avoid drying out the surface or, worse, burning it, place it in the baking pan, leaving it lined, as if it were in foil . The ideal temperature is 360°F/180°C, although there's nothing stopping you from lowering it to 320°F/160°C, for a sweeter result, increasing the cooking time. Only towards the last 10 minutes can you "unwrap" it, to brown the outside.
Meatloaf, however, can also be cooked in other ways, all of which aim to make it juicy. How? For example, by first browning it in a pan, if desired with a sauté and deglazed with white wine, like a roast, to form a crust, and then continuing in the oven, basting it with the cooking juices. Or completely in a pan, basting with hot broth and covering with a lid. Finally, boiled, or rather, boiled: wrap it tightly in a clean tea towel and immerse it in cold water, flavored and seasoned to taste (or not), just like a broth. Once ready, always let the meatloaf settle at room temperature for about ten minutes: don't cut it immediately, or it will fall apart.
6. Not Trying Alternative Versions
More than a mistake, a limitation. Like meatballs, meatloaf is no longer just about meat. There are countless variations: if you prefer fish, there's tuna and salmon meatloaf, while with vegetables, there's room for mixed vegetables, as in the vegetable meatloaf, or individual vegetables, from the summery recipe with eggplant to the autumnal one with pumpkin, by way of a four-season recipe with zucchini. And for special occasions, there's the meatloaf in a crust: the dough returns to being meat (beef and turkey), stuffed with spinach and scamorza cheese, brushed with mustard and "embellished" with a puff pastry shell.
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