By Early June. Twenty-five weeks pregnant. Cody is in Memphis this week at the wood-fired-oven stage. He texts me daily with photos of pizza dough at various hydration levels. He is in love with the technique. He has been carrying a small notebook around the Memphis kitchen taking notes on the chef’s knife-work and on the wood-fired-oven temperature management.
Sunday I made buffalo chicken meat loaf because Dustin had loved the buffalo blue cheese meatloaf from January and had been requesting a return engagement. Same architecture — ground beef and ground turkey blend, blue cheese pockets, hot sauce, the glaze of hot sauce and butter and honey brushed at the forty-minute mark — with small refinements I had been thinking about since the original: more blue cheese, less honey in the glaze, fresh chives folded into the meat.
The procedure: combine a pound of ground beef and a pound of ground turkey with a half-cup of breadcrumbs, two eggs, a quarter-cup of buffalo hot sauce, three tablespoons of melted butter, four cloves of grated garlic, a half-cup of finely diced yellow onion, one cup of crumbled blue cheese, a quarter-cup of fresh chives chopped, salt and pepper. Form into a loaf in a deep loaf pan. Bake at three-seventy-five for forty minutes. Brush with a glaze of two tablespoons hot sauce + one tablespoon melted butter + one teaspoon honey. Continue baking twenty more minutes. Total bake sixty minutes. Dustin had three thick slices. I had two.
Buffalo Chicken Meat Loaf
Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 55 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 10 minutes | Servings: 6
Ingredients
- 2 lbs ground chicken
- 1/2 cup buffalo wing sauce, divided
- 1/2 cup plain breadcrumbs
- 1/4 cup whole milk
- 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1/2 cup finely diced celery (about 2 stalks)
- 1/3 cup finely diced yellow onion
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese (optional, for topping)
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
Instructions
- Preheat oven. Heat oven to 375°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper or lightly grease a 9x5-inch loaf pan.
- Soak the breadcrumbs. In a large mixing bowl, combine breadcrumbs and milk. Let sit for 2–3 minutes until the milk is absorbed.
- Mix the loaf. Add ground chicken, eggs, celery, onion, garlic, smoked paprika, salt, pepper, and 1/4 cup of the buffalo sauce to the bowl. Mix gently with your hands until just combined — do not overmix or the loaf will be tough.
- Shape and place. Turn the mixture onto the prepared baking sheet and shape into a roughly 9x4-inch loaf, or press evenly into the loaf pan.
- Make the glaze. Whisk together the remaining 1/4 cup buffalo sauce and 2 tablespoons melted butter. Brush half of the glaze over the top and sides of the loaf.
- Bake. Bake for 45 minutes. Brush with remaining glaze and continue baking for 10–15 more minutes, until the internal temperature reaches 165°F on an instant-read thermometer.
- Rest and serve. Let the meat loaf rest for 10 minutes before slicing. Top with crumbled blue cheese if desired and serve warm.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 310 | Protein: 32g | Fat: 14g | Carbs: 10g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 780mg