December 30, 2024 – January 5, 2025

Happy New Year. Winter has set in here at Casa Stuarti. Happy New Year, and we hope that you’re warm and safe and with family and friends and pets and books.

Monday:                               Pesto Beans

Tuesday:                               New Year’s Eve at Katie and Dave’s

Alas, no picture, but this was the best meal of the week. Katie cooked a supremely wonderful pork shoulder, Dave poured drinks, Hilda and Tim and Ceil were there, as was Maggie – in the back room.

Wednesday:                       Sweet and Sour Pork with Rice and Celery Salad

Thursday:                             Tenderloin Hash

Friday:                                   Polenta with Shrimp and Zucchini

Onion Pizza

Sunday:                                 Meatloaf with Root Vegetable Purée and Celery Salad

Mom, where’s the Meatloaf?

It has gotten cold and snowy in Pittsburgh and this calls for roasts and soups and wood fires (before they’re outlawed) and warming drinks and, for those who grew up in the golden age of Betty Crocker cuisine – meatloaf.

Meatloaf as we know it in America, did not appear in any cookbook or printed menu until the late 1800s, as a variation on the Pennsylvania Dutch concoction made of pork and cornmeal known as Scrapple, which I like but which Beez looks at with the same revulsion that vampires have for garlic.

But it turns out that there are meatloaf-like dishes all over the world.  In the UK, it is a pork loaf known as haslet.  In Denmark they mix pork and beef, top it with cubes of bacon and call it forloren hare (mock hare).  The French make a version they call pain viande (you can figure that one out for yourself).  I could go on, but you can read the article in Wikipedia yourself.  I will just add one more variant – the Romanian version unfortunately named drob.  If you are one of those sophisticates who think that the name meatloaf is plebeian or inelegant, just thank your lucky stars that I’m not giving you a recipe for drob.  Also, we will pray for you to dismount from your high horse before you’re thrown off or attacked by the local villagers with pitchforks.

At Casa Stuarti, where we do not pride ourselves on our sophistication (except when it comes to soccer), we enjoy a good meatloaf from time to time.  And the middle of winter is a very good time to enjoy this concoction.  The version offered below comes from a cookbook young William gave to me for Christmas – Michael Symon’s Simply Symon Suppers.  If you don’t know this supremely bald chef with the infectious laugh and the great restaurant in Cleveland – of all the gin joints on earth . . .  – you should get acquainted with him.

He is a great cook, a great teacher of cooking and, in this book puts together complete dinners – not just single recipes – appropriate for various times of year.  About as useful a cookbook as I own.  It is, perhaps, not a cookbook for a new cook, but just a little bit of experience, patience and planning will allow you to cook the most complicated recipes in this book.

If it’s cold where you are, I suggest you start with Symon’s meatloaf, accompanied by root vegetable purée and celery salad.*  Eat this in front of a roaring fire and go to bed early under a nice quilt and you will be immune to whatever ridiculously low temperature or suffocating blanket of snow prevails outside your house.

This recipe should feed six and if you are fewer than six you will have the great pleasure of meatloaf sandwiches on the following day.  This should make any red-blooded American who grew up in the fifties and sixties root for more snow and cold – and for his children to shovel the walk.

*You can cook either of these elements separately.  We used the celery salad with a tetrazzini dish (it helps to cut through the richness of any meat or pasta dish), and the root vegetable purée can be used anywhere you’d use mashed potatoes.  We used the leftovers to make spectacular potato pancakes.

Classic Meatloaf

(from Michael Symon’s Simply Simon Suppers)

Michael Symon: “Back in culinary school, I once asked my professor what the difference was between pâté and meatloaf.  After cursing me out in French he said, “About $20.”

Timing:                     80 minutes – add 1 hour if you’re going to use the roasted garlic, which I recommend

Ingredients:                                  Serves 4 – 6

   For the roasted garlic:  

1 head garlic, intact, remove loose papery skin

1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil

   For the glaze:

1 cup ketchup, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce,

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon apple cider or sherry vinegar,

ground black pepper

   For the meatloaf:

2 pounds ground beef (80%)

2 large eggs, beaten

1 cup panko breadcrumbs

2 small yellow onions, finely chopped (1 cup or so)

½ cup finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 teaspoon sweet paprika

½ teaspoon cayenne

½ teaspoon Old Bay seasoning

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

Prep:

If you’re going to use the root vegetable purée as an accompaniment, get out 1 ½ sticks of butter and let them come to room temperature.

If you’re going to use the roasted garlic, do it first.  Preheat the oven to 400 F.  Slice the top ¼ inch of the garlic head to expose the cloves.  Place the garlic head cut-side up on a large piece of foil, drizzle the olive oil and form a loose packet by gathering foil around the garlic.  Place on oven rack and roast for 1 hour (it should be soft).  Remove, open foil and set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 375 F

Make the glaze – you can do this while the garlic is roasting:  In a bowl, whisk all ingredients together.

Measure out panko, assemble Worcestershire, sweet paprika, cayenne, Old Bay.

Chop onions and parsley and beat eggs.

Make the meatloaf:

Line a sheet pan with foil.

In a very large mixing bowl, spread out ground beef and add the other ingredients by distributing evenly across the beef.  If using the garlic, squeeze the cloves out of the head and into the bowl.

Now mix to combine, but don’t overwork – you want to distribute the ingredients well, but don’t obsess over that.

With your hands, form the mixture into a loaf and place it on the lined sheet pan.  Coat the top and sides with the glaze.  Transfer to the oven and bake, uncovered for about 1 hour.  The glaze should be sticky, the loaf golden brown.  If you are neurotic, you should know that the internal temperature should be 160 F.

Let the meatloaf sit for five minutes before serving.  It is great with the salad and purée below.

Celery Salad

(Michael Symon from Simply Symon Suppers)

Timing:                                             8 minutes? (Quick)

Ingredients:                                            Serves 4*

*If I ever meet Michael, I’m going to ask him why he pairs a salad that serves 4 with a meatloaf that serves 6.

4 celery stalks, thinly sliced (about 2 cups)

1 cup celery leaves (do not discard the tops of your celery, and don’t buy the prepackage, scalped celery that doesn’t have any tops).  If you don’t have a full cup, don’t worry and/or you can eke them out with parsley leaves.

2 heads Belgian endive, cut crosswise into ½” pieces

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 tablespoon grainy mustard

1 teaspoon honey (this is important, the celery is astringent and the endive bitter – you need some sweetness)

Kosher salt and ground black pepper.

Assemble the salad:  In a salad bowl, whisk together the olive oil, vinegar, grainy mustard, Dijon and honey and season with salt and pepper.  Add the celery, celery leaves, and endive and toss to combine.

Root Vegetable Purée

(Michael Symon from Simply Symon Suppers)

Timing:                                              About 45 minutes

Ingredients:                                         Serves 6

2 pounds russet potatoes, peeled and roughly chopped

2 pounds parsnips, peeled and roughly chopped

1 ½ sticks butter at room temperature

½ teaspoon grated nutmeg

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

Cook:

Put the potatoes, parsnips and 2 tablespoons of salt into a pot, add water to cover and bring to a boil over high heat.  Reduce heat to medium low to maintain a gentle simmer.  At 20 minutes the potatoes should be easy to pierce with a fork, remove to a colander.  In another 10 minutes the parsnips should be fork tender, drain into colander with potatoes, then return the potatoes and parsnips to the pan and let sit for 5 minutes.

Now add the butter and nutmeg and season with a pinch of salt and pepper, then mash until creamy and use a whisk to whip until fluffy.  Serve immediately or keep warm until serving.  (Cover pot.)