comfort music and food

Well, it's been a long few weeks with crazy work schedules and friend commitments, which means I need some "me" time. This means cooking a comforting meal and listening to some blues. I find it very comforting to turn off my TV, talk radio, news, etc. and just let myself be in the moment with my music. It calms me and clears the clutter out of my head. :)

Go ahead and press play while you read.



So, I made my twist on meatloaf (something I never really loved as a child, except as meatloaf sandwiches for leftovers).

My first twist on this is that I use ground turkey, tomato sauce (no ketchup), and lots of italian seasonings (garlic, basil, oregano typically). My next twist is that I put the turkey in a cupcake pan so that you get individually portioned turkey patties of sorts. I also stuff the inside with some sort of cheese.

I ate that with some orzo and a nice salad...yummy.

So, the ingredients:














First, make your basic meatloaf recipe with your ground meat, a couple eggs (I only used 2), some bread crumbs and some onions. Then put in 1/2 a can of tomato sauce and 1/2 a can of crushed tomatoes. I like the texture of crushed tomatoes, but don't like huge chunks.

Mix in however much garlic you really like. I got lazy and used pre-chopped garlic last night. I put a couple Tablespoons in, but I love garlic.

If you'd like extra cheeziness, add in some parmesan.
Put in plenty of your favorite seasonings. I used basil, oregano, a pinch of salt and fresh ground pepper. I typically don't use much salt when I cook.

Note: you could use the ground turkey that's already "italian seasoned," but the sodium levels are kind of crazy.

Sorry there aren't many great pictures. The process of meatloaf isn't all that photogenic.


Put the meat in the muffin pans (after spraying really well with your favorite non-stick spray). My mom got me an olive oil sprayer for Christmas and I love it. You refill it with olive oil and pump it a few times before each use. Awesome.







Once the meat is in the muffin pan, choose your favorite cheese for the filling. I like to use one that gets nice and gooey. I chose mozzarella pearls.















Put a few of those in the center of each turkey muffin (I don't have a good term for this yet).
Then cover with more turkey and put in the oven at 350 for about half an hour.











While that is going, go ahead and make yourself a salad.
Here's what mine looked like:
Field greens, avocado and asiago cheese.


Then I cooked my orzo.
Basically, cook a couple cups of orzo.
















Add in the remaining tomato sauce, crushed tomatoes, a bunch of garlic, basil and oregano and a HEAP of parmesan cheese. You can also add some red wine if you'd like. I do that if it's too salty. If it's too sweet, then I add more salt and pepper. Just keep tasting until it's good (or until you're full and can't eat any for the meal anyway...hah!) Trust me. This stuff is addictive.




The turkey should come out looking like this:




















... and the wine I chose was one I picked up a a small wine shop in Gruene, TX called The Grapevine.
I like how light and smooth this wine is. It's definitely not a "sweet" wine, but it just sits easy in your mouth and is smooth.














So, here are my plates at the end of the evening:

















Lastly...to wrap up the evening with some cheer...here's Ray living it up, man. Oh, and if you go to the actual YouTube video, you'll see a comment from someone stating the following "Talk about no talent, rippin off Kayne like dat." I'm a little sad and highly disturbed that someone would think that Ray Charles ripped off Kanye. I'm hoping the post was a joke.