Another busy week, cant believe it is the middle of May already, Christmas shopping next....(if you could see the amount of people on my Xmas list you would realise I'm only half kidding). I have had some really great emails from some of my cooking class students, it is very inspiring to hear their success stories, or "almost" success stories........the following is an excerpt of an email from my friend Jo, this made me laugh so much I had to share....
1. Take mince out of freezer Sunday morning at 9:30am and put on the bench to thaw. Note to buy soft brown sugar. Feel proud to be so organised.
2. 6pm stop by super market to pick up soft brown sugar. Much anticipation at the pending success of my dish.
3. Home by 6:30pm. Get out meat loaf tin. Check recipe - takes one hour. Are starving and can't wait that long. Eat some bread and decide to see what other tins are lurking in the cupboard. Find large muffin tin & smaller meat loaf tin. Decide to make 6 meatloaf muffins and a smaller meat loaf for dinner tomorrow night. Or the muffins could be good for lunch? Feel we have diverted semi disaster. Keep going.
4. Measure out the bread crumbs. Clean the bread crumbs from the cupboard as the bottom of the bag had spilt. Hubby tapes up bag with masking tape.
5. Get two large onions out to cut finely as per recipe. try remember what size onions Kristina used. Cut up one large onion in Tupperware onion cutter and enjoy the experience of no tears. Decide can put 2nd onion in if needs it.
6. Open the packet of pork mince. Find it to be frozen in the middle.
7. Check the beef mince (which was sitting under the pork mince) and find it still frozen 9 hours later.
8. Freeze fingers squeezing the frozen centre of the pork mince into bits whilst hubby places beef mince wrapped in glad wrap in hot water to thaw.
9. Put in the other ingredients. Get brave and put in 1/2 tsp extra of curry. Squeeze the last of the t-sauce to be a tablespoon shy of 1/2 a cup.
10Start making the sauce while hubby mixes in semi thawed mince with pork mixture
11 start making the sauce. Find I don't have coffee or Worcestershire sauce ...damn
12. Make second trip to the supermarket
13. Real estate agent calls whilst at super market to come over with an offer.
14. Get home, finish making the sauce
15 See real estate agent, dont' sign anything. During conversation rush to oven to baste meat loaf muffins and mini meatloaf
16. 7:45pm. Meat loafs smelling and looking good. Decide what veges to have. take out broccoli to steam. Hubby asks "do we have potatoes for the mashed potatoes?".....damn
17 Contemplate trip 3 to supermarket. Find large kumera in the pantry and go with that.
18 Meat loaf is now cooked (been 50 mins!) but waiting for water to boil to cook kumera. cut kumera into tiny pieces to speed cooking time! Take meat loaf and meat loaf muffins out of the oven and place on rack on the bench.
19 Hubby mashes kumera then tips meatloaf upside down onto tin foil Wifey asks why as Kristina didn't do that. So he puts it back in. She finds can't cut the loaf in the tin as will cut the tin. So hubby tips it back out again.
20. Haven't tasted the sauce. Bit tart, have sweet kumera so will work well. Serve up.
21. realise forgot to cook broccoli ....damn. put lettuce on the plate.
22 How does it taste - onions aren't cooked (chop smaller!) . Meat a bit bland, sprinkle with flaked salt. Yum! Sauce and kumera are great!
23. Sit down and laugh at the steps 1 to 22 above. Very filling.
I am impressed with the ability for thinking on ones feet guys, nice!
This is the recipe, it was given to me years ago by an old boyfriend's step-father, hence it was known to me as Malcolm's meatloaf. But I took some around to my lovely ex neighbours and meet their gorgeous new son, and Anna called it "love in the mouth" meatloaf, cant top that for a name really can you?
Meatloaf
500 grams Mince
500 grams Sausage meat (I just use plain Pork sausages from my butcher, split the skins and put the filling straight into the mixing bowl)
2 onions-chopped finely
1 cup breadcrumbs-fresh or packet is fine
1 Tsp curry powder (any kind, hot or mild)
1 egg
½ cup milk
½ cup water
Mix all the ingredients together (this is easiest if you use your hands) and press into a greased loaf tin. It may seem a little sloppy but this is fine, it will stay moist when baking. Bake for approx 1 hour. This may vary slightly depending on your oven. About halfway through cooking put a couple of teaspoons of your sauce over the top of the meatloaf. This is called basting. It will form a nice glaze on the top. To test doneness, put a skewer of knife into the middle of the meatloaf, leave it for a couple of seconds then pull it out, it should feel hot to the touch, if not continue cooking for a bit longer & test again.
Sauce
For your sauce, place all the following ingredients in a small saucepan, and bring to a boil. Turn the heat to low, and let the mixture simmer (boil gently with just a few bubbles popping on top of the liquid) for 5 minutes.
½ cup water
2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
½ cup Tomato sauce (I use Watties)
2Tbsp Vinegar (Malt is fine, or white)
2 Tbsp Lemon juice
½ cup Brown sugar
30 grams Butter
1 tsp instant Coffee powder
I like this with mashed potato and a green vege. Winter comfort food at it's best....
Preparations are full steam for Saturday's inaugural Plum Kitchen Supperclub.........I am really excited, and pretty organised, which I hope will see me through the inevitable 'what was I THINKING??!' moment when the kitchen is full of pots & pans & I have a room full of people to feed.....watch this space!
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