Meatloaf, with love
This is the Mel's Kitchen column that ran in the paper last week. I would have posted it to the blog before now, but I just got back to town.
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It’s funny how you associate certain foods with certain people. For me, every time I make meatloaf, I think of my grandfather, who I lost this week.
One of Pa’s favorite things was meatloaf, and he especially loved my meatloaf. So much so, in fact, that it got him in trouble with my grandma. The first time I made a meatloaf for him, he looked at my grandma across the table and told her, “This is even better than yours.” She told him he could kiss her butt and that she would never make a meatloaf for him again.
That didn’t stop her from calling me weeks later for my recipe. And even though she followed it exactly, it didn’t stop him from telling me in our weekly phone call that it still wasn’t as good as mine.
I like to think it tasted better when I made it because I was special to him, and he knew I put a little extra love in when I was making it.
Growing up, I was always “his girl.” We lived two doors down from my grandparents, and they spoiled me and my brother rotten. But Pa was surely the worst offender. Whenever Mom and Dad said no, I would run to Pa the first chance I got, where I almost always heard yes.
As I grew up, he would give me advice along with the small gifts or the little bit of extra spending money he always slipped me. I heard about saving my money, how checking the oil was the life of my car, how life could be hard, and how I would realize, one day, that everything he and my grandma and parents told me was true, and that I would appreciate it when I was older.
Sure enough, when I got out on my own and couldn’t figure out how to check the air in my tires or would come up short on the bills one month, I would call him in tears, and he would say, “Wasn’t I right? I told you life could be hard.” But he’d also tell me how to fill up the tires or that he would slip a little extra into my bank account first chance he got.
So, I would do what I could to show my appreciation, like making him a meatloaf whenever I saw him. When I could, I would make two — one for dinner for the family, and one to keep him in meatloaf sandwiches for at least a week after I left.
In fact, a meatloaf sandwich was one of the last home-cooked meals he had. Just before he went into the hospital he made a meatloaf from my recipe, with direction from my grandma, who has been confined to a wheelchair for the past few months.
Grandma brought a meatloaf sandwich to the hospital last week after Pa complained about the food they were serving him. He always said there was nothing better than leftover meatloaf on a sandwich.
I hope he enjoyed it.
Pa’s Meatloaf
2 pounds lean ground beef
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1 egg, beaten
11/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
4 ounces tomato sauce
1/4 cup water
6-8 ounces spaghetti sauce (Barilla marinara)
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
2 tablespoons mustard
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
Combine ground beef, bread crumbs, onion, egg, salt, pepper, spaghetti sauce, and water. Mix together well. Shape into a loaf and place in shallow 7-by-11-inch baking pan. In a saucepan, combine cider vinegar, brown sugar, prepared mustard, tomato sauce and Worcestershire sauce. Bring mixture to boil and pour sauce over meatloaf. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour 15 minutes, basting occasionally. Serves 6 to 8.
