Meat and Tater Tuesday: Szechuan Chicken Meatloaf with Grilled New Potatoes

I've been meaning to make this chicken meatloaf, from Cooking Light, for a while now. It's really unlike anything I've made in the past, and it sounded like a blend of flavors my family would love. I've never cooked with ground chicken, and I'm not a huge fan of ground meat in general, but I loved this dish. It was a perfect blend of meaty, sweet, spicy, and flavorful. The texture was perfect, too, though I'm curious to see how it reheats (Kevin is taking it to work tomorrow). I made some simple modification to the recipe, based on ingredients I had on hand, and adjusting it to my family's desired level of spiciness. I listed my mods below, in case you're interested in having this dish, the "Marji way." Oh, and the potatoes (courtesy of Paula Deen) were an afterthought, because I needed something on the side. This dish would have been perfect with corn on the cob, but we finished it last night, so we were veggie-less. Anyway, it was a success - I hope to make it again soon. By the way - it was a very easy dish to throw together. The cooking time (50 minutes to cook,and 10 minutes to rest) was a limiting factor, for working folks, but I'd highly recommend it on a night when you have an hour to make dinner.





My loaf pan was too big, so the loaf was sort of flat and wide. Next time, I don't think I'd use a loaf pan - I'll just form a loaf on a cookie sheet.

Szechuan Chicken Meat Loaf

Yield: 6 servings (serving size: 2 slices)

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon dark sesame oil
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped green onions
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped carrot
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped celery
• 1/2 teaspoon minced peeled gingerroot or 1/8 teaspoon ground ginger (I used ground)
  
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 cup cooked long-grain rice (I used brown rice)
  
• 1/4 cup chopped water chestnuts (I omitted these - blech)
  
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose Szechwan hot and spicy sauce (I used Sriracha - it was so spicy, so only 1 tbl)
  
• 1 pound ground chicken or ground turkey (I used chicken)
  
• Vegetable cooking spray
• 2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted

Preparation

Heat oil in a small nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add green onions, carrot, celery, gingerroot, and garlic; sauté 2 minutes or until tender.

Combine green onion mixture, rice, water chestnuts, soy sauce, and Szechwan sauce in a large bowl; stir well. Crumble chicken over green onion mixture, and stir just until blended.

Preheat oven to 350°. Pack mixture into an 8 x 4-inch loaf pan (I used a 9 x 5 pan, and this led to a wide, flat loaf - oops) coated with cooking spray; sprinkle sesame seeds over top of loaf. Bake at 350° for 50 minutes or until meat loaf registers 160°. Let loaf stand in pan 10 minutes.

Remove loaf from pan; cut into 12 slices. Serve with Chinese hot mustard and sweet-and-sour sauce, if desired.

Nutritional Information

Calories: 163 (27% from fat)

Fat: 4.8g (sat 0.9g,mono 1.5g,poly 1.5g)

Protein:c18.1g

Carbohydrate:11.1g

Fiber: 0.5g

Cholesterol: 53mg

Iron: 1.4mg

Sodium: 404mg

Calcium: 22mg

Cooking Light, MARCH 1996


The Critique
WOW!!! There are few things that really knock my socks off but this one did. This could be one of my favorite meals that Marji has ever made for me. It's rare for me to have such strong feelings for something that she made that is not soup. But this is a hands down, 5 bowler. These smell like they're made in a high-end Asian restaurant that tends to have at least an hour wait to get in on a Tuesday. They tasted so perfect in every way that I would not dare to make any suggestions to mess with such perfection. I loved the sesame seeds on the top and the seasoning throughout the meat. I'm a huge fan of seasoned meats, especially with seasoned ground meat. The chicken tasted superb and to make it even better, it reheated perfectly! I couldn't ask for more. Definitely a very large 5 bowls.

Barbecued Chicken with a Mustard Glaze and Curried Couscous Salad

You may have noticed that I cook a positively absurd amount of chicken, rice, and potatoes. Well, there is actually a reason for that. You see, I was a vegetarian for about 10 years. I was even a vegan for a couple of those 10 years, so I am very attached to vegetarian food. I love grains, vegetables, soy protein, etc. Several years ago, I went back to eating poultry once in a blue moon, but I haven't really gone any further. In fact, for a very long time, I wouldn't even eat poultry at home. I would reserve it for special occasions, when we would go out to dinner. As Kevin and I decided to start this blog, though, I agreed to start eating chicken at home. This is actually a big deal for me, so I am proud to be tasting the food I cook at home.

Kevin, on the other hand, is almost dairy free. He despises cheese, milk, butter, and cream, which definitely limits our mealtime goodies. If I can hide dairy in whatever I am cooking, it's fine, but there is no way to mask cheese. I've tried. He can tell. Anyway, I have gotten very creative in my cooking, but we are still somewhat limited. Hence, the chicken, the grains, and the potatoes.

Anyway, last night's dinner was thrown together very quickly, though, when I planned it, I assumed it was going to take forever to put together. The Barbecued Chicken came from a Cooking Light recipe. I have made it before, but not since coming into the possession of a grill pan. I really liked the flavor of the chicken, and it stayed juicy, and retained the flavor of the sauce. The Curried Couscous was a recipe from Ina Garten (a.k.a The Barefoot Contessa). My friend, Katie, made this recipe for book club once, and I loved it, so I decided to give it a try. The recipe calls for red onion and currants, neither of which I had on hand. I wanted to use raisins, but Kevin gave me the head-shake on that idea. I think it would have so much better with those 2 additions, because it would have added another dimension to the dish. It had a nice flavor - in fact, I really liked it, but there was something missing (um, perhaps onions and currants?). I would make this again - the right way. All in all, this was an easy meal, with a good, solid flavor, and it used a lot of things that I had on hand in the kitchen.





The Critique
Loved the chicken - very juicy, tasty well cooked and just overall great. 4 bowls



Cous cous - not the biggest fan of slightly warmed food. It was a little strange because the carrots were raw but the cous cous was cooked and it gave the entire meal a luke warm temperature. It kind of reminded me of food that was sitting in your car on a hot day that wasn't supposed to be warm. However, the next day, I reheated it (actually Marji reheated it for me) and fully warmed with the chicken cut up into pieces, it tasted delicious. 3 bowls.

"Pork Chops" with Mango Scallion Couscous and Grilled Zucchini

Call us Kosher (even though we're not), call us picky, call us snobby... but we still won't eat pork in our house. We never ate in my house, growing up, and for some reason, I can't get into it. That being said, I know it has been deemed, "The other white meat," so sometimes I pork recipes, but use chicken. I figure the flavors are probably similar. True or false? Someone enlighten me. Anyway, I found this simple recipe in Everyday with Rachael Ray, and decided to try it in my new grill pan. Let me begin, by saying that I thought this was a relatively simple recipe, but for some reason, even the simplest recipes seem to turn my kitchen into a chaotic mess. Can I blame the kids? Anyway, Kevin was on "Third Call," meaning that he was home, but there was a small chance he'd get called into work. Well, in the heart of my mess-making, he was called in, Jonah woke up from a nap, and Maya needed a diaper change. Oy. Anyway, the end result of this recipe was just okay. I mean, I liked it, but it was rather plain. I didn't use the mango, because apparently, you can't judge a mango by its peel, and it was less than ideal when I cut into it. I used whole wheat couscous, and loved the flavor of the grilled scallions and zucchini, but I think the mango would have added a nice summer flavor to the dish. The chicken was pretty dry, which I think is a typical issue with grill pans. Anyone know how to remedy this? I'm open to ideas. Anyway, Kevin at this one reheated, when he got home from the hospital, and he found that it had gotten very dry, once put in the fridge. I think I'd make the couscous again, but the chicken was didn't really absorb the flavors particularly well, so I might opt for a stronger marinade next time.


This mango had such promise, but it lacked good texture and flavor on the inside. I'm new to the world of mangos, so I'll forgive this time!

Jonah's dinner.

Couscous looks so pretty, but it's a clean up challenge for sure.

I grilled the zucchini and scallions before cutting them. This is a great time saver, when it comes to flipping things on the grill.

Wrapping up Kevin's meal for later. Dinner is just not as much fun when he isn't around.


The Critique
The food was great when it came off the skillet. However, I ended up getting called back to work so that I was unable to really get a chance to enjoy the food. From what I ate, I really liked it. When I came home, the reheated chicken was a bit dry, which seems to be an ongoing theme with our reheated chicken. Being such a lover of leftovers, this is a big issue. Any suggestions on how to avoid having dry reheated chicken?

The flavor was a bit cajunny and not overseasoned at all. Really enjoyed it. Cous cous tends to be a pain in the butt to eat because if you use a fork, it gets all over the place and then its a beotch to clean up.

Chicken - 3 bowls
Cous cous - 3 bowls
Vegetables - 3 bowls

for all

Lentil Loaf with Grilled Onion and Potatoes

I love the idea of Meatless Mondays, even though we have many meatless days around these parts. This week, I decided to make this lentil loaf, from My Vegan Cookbook. I've made it before, but, frankly, it's a lot of work. The recipe has a lot of ingredients, and the first (and only other time) I made it, I made several mistakes, which led to sort of an odd tasting, oddly textured loaf. This time, on the other hand, I did it right. It was delicious, and it actually stayed together, which is saying a lot for a vegetarian loaf. The thing I like about this one, is that the "glue," is actually tofu, not eggs. It's incredibly healthy and has a perfect blend of spices. The topping is a sweet and spicy tomato mixture, and there is leftover to use as a dipping sauce. I recently bought a new grill pan, so I decided to use it to make these grilled potatoes with vidalia onions. They came out good, but I needed to finish them off in the oven, since they didn't cook quite quickly enough. All in all, a very tasty, meatless meal!

There were about 10 more ingredients... These were just the pantry ones..."


Tasty lentil loaf.
Maybe not so pretty, but tastes good nonetheless.

Who knew you could grill onions and taters right on the stovetop?

My daughter loved these.


The critique
I loved it. This is my second time eating this and she greatly improved from the first time. It was much more solidly put together, and had the most amazing taste to it. Also, the tomato paste had less of the "makes your face pucker" issue, which can sometimes detract from the experience. I loved the food, but it's extremely unfilling, which is an issue with vegetarian food for me. I literally ate the entire loaf. 4 bowls.


The vegetables were phenomenal. I'm in love with the roasted onions thang. Bring it! 4 bowls.