Meet the Meat Muffins

What do you do if you want your toddler and preschooler to eat something?

Make it into the shape of a muffin! (Or a pie slice -- more on that in another post.)

Since I'm on a recipe roll, I thought I'd post my (in)famous Turkey Meatloaf Muffin recipe. Or, as we call them in our house, Meat Muffins. Frankly, the best part of this recipe is that I can tweak here and there for a different dish. And it's stupid easy and fast. Also, this recipe started as a bulk recipe for the scratch cafe I used to work at, using 10 lbs of ground turkey. Obviously, I've modified a bit -- but you can still make this into a loaf. It just takes longer to cook.

So without further ado, the recipe:

Turkey Meatloaf Muffins

1 lb ground turkey (80/20 -- pls, don't use the fat-free version. It's no good.)
1 small onion (or ~ 1/2 cup), very small dice
1 garlic clove, minced
1 egg
1/4 cup plain bread crumbs
~ 1 TB Worchestershire sauce
2 TB ketchup
2 tsp salt (I use Kosher salt)*
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/2 to 1 tsp poultry seasoning

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Saute the onion and garlic in a small amount of olive oil until they're soft and translucent. Cool slightly.
3. In a bowl, combine turkey, breadcrumbs, egg, ketchup, Worchestershire, salt, pepper and poultry seasoning. Add onions and garlic, and mix until just combined (don't overmix).
4. Spray the bottoms of a 12 cup muffin pan with Pam spray (precautionary). Plop blobs of meatloaf into cups, trying to evenly distribute. Flatten tops slightly.
5. Cook muffins in oven for 25-30 mins, or until instant read thermometer reads 170 inside a muffin. (In my experience, 25 mins. really does it, since these are pretty small muffins. You'll only fill each cup halfway, if that.)
6. Cool slightly, then remove from cups and rest on paper-towel covered plate to soak up excess liquid (water, fat). Serve with more ketchup and enjoy.

In a hurry: Skip the sauteing and use onion and garlic powder instead. But easy on the garlic powder -- it's got a fake garlicky taste if you use too much. I'd use maybe 1-2 tsp onion powder, and no more than 1/2 tsp garlic powder.

Italian Meatballs: You can sub ground chicken if you want, but not necessary...

• Increase ketchup to 3 TB.
• Leave out the poultry seasoning. Instead, use Italian seasoning, or just dried basil and oregano (easy on the oregano), or basil and parsley.
• Add about 1/4 to 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese or Romano.
• Grate the onion using a box grater or food processor.
• Increase garlic up to 3 cloves.
• Form small meat balls with your hands (yes, your hands). Brown the meatballs in olive oil on all sides, then finish in the oven for ~ 20 mins. until done.
• Plop meatballs in your favorite pasta sauce and heat through.

* Ok, I'm admitting I have a salt thing. This amount is conservative, folks. I like well-seasoned food, and after working in a restaurant kitchen I like it even more. That said, I've found that the key to cooking ground meat concoctions (e.g. meatloaf, meatballs, hamburgers) is salt -- and sometimes a shockingly large amount of it. With raw meats, you COULD cook a small amount to test and then adjust. Or, you could just do like me, and err on the side of hypertension...