Help me fix my meatloaf
Hi!
I have a super simple meatloaf recipe that I've been making for years. It's very tasty, extremely moist.
Here's the recipe:
3 pounds 80/20 ground beef
2 cups bread crumbs (1380mg sodium, 132g carb)
4 eggs
1 cup ketchup (2560mg sodium, 80g carb)
1 tbsp low sodium soy sauce (575mg sodium, 1g carb)
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese (900mg sodium, 0g carb)
1 tbsp minced garlic (0mg sodium, 3g carb)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. I mix all the ingredients together by hand then pack the mix into an 8"x8" pan then flip it onto a foil covered sheet pan. If you do this, either line the 8x8 or grease it 'cause the meat doesn't usually want to come out.
Bake for seventy minutes.
The entire loaf has 5415 sodium and 216 carb.
Before needing to watch what we ate, my wife would have a quarter of it for dinner, with pasta and veggies, and I would have about half, with pasta and veggies.
I need to decrease the carb and the sodium of the meatloaf.
The next time I make this I'd already planned on removing the cheese. After that...
Thanks for suggestions!
Paul
I have a super simple meatloaf recipe that I've been making for years. It's very tasty, extremely moist.
Here's the recipe:
3 pounds 80/20 ground beef
2 cups bread crumbs (1380mg sodium, 132g carb)
4 eggs
1 cup ketchup (2560mg sodium, 80g carb)
1 tbsp low sodium soy sauce (575mg sodium, 1g carb)
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese (900mg sodium, 0g carb)
1 tbsp minced garlic (0mg sodium, 3g carb)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. I mix all the ingredients together by hand then pack the mix into an 8"x8" pan then flip it onto a foil covered sheet pan. If you do this, either line the 8x8 or grease it 'cause the meat doesn't usually want to come out.
Bake for seventy minutes.
The entire loaf has 5415 sodium and 216 carb.
Before needing to watch what we ate, my wife would have a quarter of it for dinner, with pasta and veggies, and I would have about half, with pasta and veggies.
I need to decrease the carb and the sodium of the meatloaf.
The next time I make this I'd already planned on removing the cheese. After that...
Thanks for suggestions!
Paul
0
Replies
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First, I'd use 93/7 beef. Second, I suggest you use Ezekiel Bread. Third, I suggest you reduce your portion size to 4 oz of meatloaf. Third I suggest you not cook pasta. You are asking to decrease carbs. Lastly I suggest that you double the vegetables with low-carb vegetable choices.0
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Use one cup of breadcrumbs. Eliminate the soy sauce, Parmesan cheese and just season to taste with salt pepper. I use 2 eggs.
I do
2 packs ground beef
1 package Bob Evans sausage (hot)
1 cup Italian Breadcrumbs
2 eggs
minced garlic, onions, green pepper, fresh oregano
season to taste
Still comes out moist and tasty. I dont like ketchup or tomato sauce on my meatloaf so it cuts down on that. Instead of potatoes, rice or pasta. I make Cauliflower Mashed Potatoes. Taste just like mashed potatoes!
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We love meatloaf in our family too. I love to take recipes and tweak them a bit to reduce sodium, cals, etc without compromising flavor. My first thought for your recipes above would be to use plain bread crumbs. The plain panko bread crumbs I have in the pantry has 50mg of sodium per 1/2 cup. That would help with the sodium. The carbs were about the same. Instead of ketchup try using a can of low sodium tomato paste. That would help with the sodium, not sure about that carbs on that one. Now I am going to have to make meatloaf this week!
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JeromeBarry1 wrote: »First, I'd use 93/7 beef.
How would 93/7 over 80/20 change the sodium or carbohydrates?0 -
I switched mine up to using ground turkey instead of beef. Instead of breadcrumbs, i got a tip from a friend to use oats. Instead of eggs, i use egg substitute. I'm guilty of adding crumbled bacon to mine though.0
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Decrease the ketchup if you want to lower the sodium. Ever seen how much sodium is in a cup of ketchup? Maybe used crushed tomatoes or tomato paste or something instead?0
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What kind of oats? I just looked at Bob's Red Mill Oats Rolled Regular, and two cups of those oats are 128g carb, vs 132g in bread crumbs, which is about the same, but zero sodium!joseccastaneda wrote: »Instead of breadcrumbs, i got a tip from a friend to use oats.
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What kind of oats? I just looked at Bob's Red Mill Oats Rolled Regular, and two cups of those oats are 128g carb, vs 132g in bread crumbs, which is about the same, but zero sodium!joseccastaneda wrote: »Instead of breadcrumbs, i got a tip from a friend to use oats.
yes, I have done this too. I just use plain Quaker oatmeal I have in the pantry. You could use half bread crumbs and half oatmeal.0 -
JeromeBarry1 wrote: »First, I'd use 93/7 beef.
How would 93/7 over 80/20 change the sodium or carbohydrates?
It wouldn't. It's a sneaky expensive way to get more meat in the loaf.
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I was just using Google looking for articles about substituting rolled oats for bread crumbs.
Has anyone heard of substituting banana's for eggs? It's a thing! There are even banana meatloaf recipes out there. If the breadcrumbs are removed, getting rid of most of the sodium, and the bananas are used to replace the eggs, I wonder how that would taste?0 -
It may sound unusual but I use quick cooking oats instead of bread crumbs. I add a little mustard to the ketchup for a savory zing. Adding veggies is always a great way to add moisture too.
Here the recipe I usually make. soupspiceeverythingnice.blogspot.com/2014/02/all-american-meatloaf.html0 -
The meatloaf sounds amazing, and doesn't really seem to need any fixing--any change in the original ratios or components would affect the flavor and texture, probably in a negative way. Why not just reduce the amount of it that you eat with your dinner? When I first started here I went all gung-ho trying to 'fix' recipes and the fixes generally turn out pretty tasteless and sad. Nowadays I try to stick to the good stuff and just eat a little less of it.
All the best! 4 -
Use pork rinds instead of breadcrumbs and nix the soy sauce. And use no sugar added or lower salt/sugar ketchup.0
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I use 93% ground turkey, 1 egg white and 1 whole egg, 1/4 cup of ketchup, garlic, salt and pepper, sometimes BBQ sauce. I also add veggies to it like corn or chopped up carrots. I bake it in a loaf pan and cut it into either 4 or 5 pieces and for about 250-300 cals each serving is pretty damn good. Serve with veggies or a small amount of mashed potatoes. yum!0
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take out most of the ketchup - grate a zucchini or a yellow squash into the mix. Adds moisture, flavor and nutrition. Extra egg will help bind the leaner ground beef into a loaf, too.0
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take out most of the ketchup - grate a zucchini or a yellow squash into the mix. Adds moisture, flavor and nutrition. Extra egg will help bind the leaner ground beef into a loaf, too.
While a zucchini or squash might replace the moisture of ketchup, there would be a huge loss of the sweet and tangy flavor.
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ValerieMartini2Olives wrote: »Use pork rinds instead of breadcrumbs and nix the soy sauce. And use no sugar added or lower salt/sugar ketchup.
So what flavor would you recommend to replace the low sodium soy sauce with? We *like* the sweet taste of the ketchup. Ketchup and soy sauce together is very reminiscent of sweet and sour meatballs made with grape jelly and chili sauce.0 -
Being perfectly honest, it sounds *kitten* delicious and personally I feel any alternatives wouldn't do it justice. Could you just have a smaller portion? Is the lower sodium/carbs a doctor's recommendation?1
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Mix in a packet of dry French Onion soup into the loaf. It's delicious.0
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Don't agree with pork rinds instead of breadcrumbs. The breadcrumbs are there to absorb moisture, pork rinds will not do the same job and the meatloaf will end up wet. If the texture is good, don't mess with the proportions, just have it with salad instead of pasta (or have less pasta and a big mound of veg).
For reducing the salt, try replacing half the ketchup with tomato puree, and reducing the amount of parmesan. I would not remove it altogether, as it may be important for flavour, just reduce the amount and see what difference it makes. Similarly I would not replace all the ketchup with tomato paste, as ketchup often has an important role in rounding out flavour, but experiment with replacing part of it.
You can tweak your recipe but overall I would concentrate on portions and sides more than messing too much with a favourite recipe that is proven to work well.1 -
This is kind of what I'm thinking.CattOfTheGarage wrote: »try replacing half the ketchup with tomato puree....I would not replace all the ketchup with tomato paste, as ketchup often has an important role in rounding out flavour
allrecipes.com says to substitute ketchup: "Mix together the tomato paste, white vinegar, brown sugar, garlic powder, onion powder, allspice, salt, molasses, corn syrup, and water in a saucepan over low heat; simmer gently until you get the consistency of ketchup, 45 minutes to 1 hour. Taste and adjust salt if necessary before serving."
I'm thinking about reducing those ingredients to tomato paste, white vinegar, and brown sugar, and see what happens. Maybe I'll swap the white vinegar with apple cider vinegar, who knows...1 -
Try using dry cream of wheat instead of breadcrumbs. About 3 Tbsp. per pound of meat. That's only 24 carbs. This was how my mother always made meatloaf so of course so do I. ( and I get raves) Also cut down or totally omit ketchup(all sugar) and moisten with a little milk.
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You could just have it with a little ketchup on the side instead of putting it in it...enough for a taste of it but not a whole cup in it. I've always dipped mine in ketchup because no one in my family likes it with it. ..granted mine is a sodium bomb anyway because i use a stove top stuffing, parmesan and A1 sauce in mine. Though i do load it with green peppers mushrooms carrots and corn..lipton onion soup mix because i dont like actual onions.1
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I make mine with half ketchup, half tomato sauce and oats instead of bread crumbs. I'll also sub 1 heaping tbs flaxmeal out for half the eggs.
Like has been suggested, try reducing some of the problem ingredients, instead of taking them out all together, which will change the recipe entirely. You could even make some "mini" loaves to taste different changes at the same time to compare.0 -
Try steel cut oats instead of breadcrumbs. At least that adds fibre (so you may feel a bit more full eating a bit less). You probably won't need 2 cups either. But measure out 2 cups and add slowly until you like the consistency. Measure the remaining and subtract to find out how much you used. Remember oats will absorb water.
Try a low sodium ketchup or condensed tomato soup. See how that goes.
Instead of cutting the cheese completely out, I'd try just using half of it.
Also if you use a leaner ground beef instead of 80/20, that will cut some fat calories. Maybe not extra lean though, that might feel too dry. You could also experiment with using ground turkey or chicken... but don't expect the texture to be the same. I find it a bit smoother that beef. You might find you need a different kind of meat when reducing the breadcrumbs or subbing with oats.
Cut the meatloaf into 6 pieces instead of eating 1/4 of it Or even 8. See if you're still hungry for more after 20 minutes. 0 -
What kind of oats? I just looked at Bob's Red Mill Oats Rolled Regular, and two cups of those oats are 128g carb, vs 132g in bread crumbs, which is about the same, but zero sodium!joseccastaneda wrote: »Instead of breadcrumbs, i got a tip from a friend to use oats.
You shouldn't need all 2 cups of oats. So there will simply be less carbs in there.0 -
if you want to remove the soy sauce, try adding another umami source: mushrooms. You can soak dried shitakes and finely chop or grind the mushrooms to add. That would add both moisture and umami.
however, I realize not everyone is a mushroom fan, so this may not work for everyone!0
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