Mechazawa-san Meatloaf

Despite pigging out at lunch (kim chi, cheese, and leftover Vietnamese lunch) I was really hungry at dinner, as was Phil. And it's still cold here, steering us to comfort food. So had some Mechazawa-san meatloaf.

Note that the ingredients are as variable as egg pie. Put in whatever you have that appeals and it most likely will come out ok. The only rules I fairly stringently follow are to allocate 1 egg per pound of meat and to put in something (bread, potato, whatever) that will absorb some of the internal juice.

Recipe:

Mechazawa-san Meatlof
Serves 2 hungry people with nothing more or up to 4 with good sides
(ingredients reflect what I had on hand; be *very* creative)

1 lb ground beef (or mixture of 1/2 lb ground beef plus 1/2 lb other meat)
1 egg
1 slice of onion
3 md white (button) mushrooms
1T lime juice
1T Worcestershire sauce (I use Bulldog Japanese)
1T Vietnamese chili-garlic sauce
1T Yellow mustard
2 - 4 T Panko or breadcrumbs or a starchy substance to soak up juices
Ketchup to taste

Chop onion and mushrooms.

Mix all ingredients. Shape into 2 - 4 loaves with indentations in the top (see picture below). The indentations are important because they hold in juice during cooking.

Picture shows the loaves (in this case, 2 loaves made from 1 lb. of beef) ready to be put on the Big Green Egg.

Start the Egg and then let the grill sit on it for about 5 min to warm up. If you are concerned about the loaves "slumping" and getting stuck to the grill, it's better to freeze the loaves for a half hour or so than to try to grease the grill for that purpose.

Put the loaves directly on the grill rack. Grill for 30 (for 4 loaves) to 50 (for one loaf) minutes. Picture at the top of the post shows one of the 2-loaf, 40-minute meatloaves (meatloafs?).

Pour ketchup on the plate around each meatloaf and serve. Picture at the top of the post shows a plated meatloaf with the ketchup around and the indentation holding the juices from cooking.

Eating notes: Mechazawa-san *anything* always is good. This was no exception. Nicely browned and crispy on the bottom, but not at all dry. Really good.