But today is a day off. I was awoken today by my roommate's alarm BLARING at 8:30am. It must have fallen between the bed and the wall, so it took him a few minutes to get it, and finally set it on the dresser. Without turning it off. Awesome. Both my roommates get home around 4-5am, and wake up at 1-2pm for a 3pm call. Why he has an 8:30am alarm, I will never know.
Anyway, it was raining all this morning, so I kept sleeping until the rain stopped, since I can't go anywhere (no car, no bike, remember?) The apartment is kind of a mess, so I decided to make a run to CVS for a bunch of cleaning supplies. When I came back, my next trip was to Trader Joe's. The entire day threatened with low, dark clouds and rain.
Flashback: A few months ago (actually, I think it was in the fall), Caitlin and I went to the Baltimore Book Festival. Caitlin is an avid reader (an understatement? I love you, baby!) and wanted to check it out, and I tagged along. I never would have gone if she hadn't suggested it, and it's another reason I love being with her: She encourages me to try things I never would have on my own. I am also a very picky reader, with an affinity for non-fiction science. I've leaned a lot towards space race-era books, and biographies of tech companies or their founders ("iWoz", "Code Name: Ginger", etc). We headed to the Daedalus Books tent and I actually found two cookbooks for $5 each (each one used to be $20 each.) When we got home, I started flipping through and earmarking recipes that I liked, and Caitlin did the same.
Now, a few days ago, I told Caitlin I was bored with the food I was making, and then remembered that I brought my cookbooks. Awesome! I flipped through them, finding recipes I could make fairly cheap (Two Whole Foods and a Trader Joe's in walking distance, but not a REAL grocery store). The one that stood out to me was "Mom's Meatloaf".
I love meatloaf. Bring it on. It was a lot of ingredients, but nothing too obscure. The most trouble I had finding was the brown sugar. I had to get organic brown sugar from Whole Foods (everything is organic there. I don't want organic butter for $5. I want cheap butter!)
Everything pulled from the fridge, ready to go. Let's do this.
Started with the pack and a half of ground beef, and added a bit more green pepper and onion to the mix, since it was left over from the chopping (like 20% more from the recipe), then the egg and the oats (why oats? i have no idea). Then the mustard, worchestershire sauce and ketchup (oops, recipe wanted tomato sauce).
Next, it called to be mixed and shaped into a loaf. First I tried it with a potato masher:
Fail. Then a spoon, that failed too. I gave up and just dove in:
Shaping it into the loaf wasn't that hard, actually. I just wrapped it up into a big ball, plopped it into the greased pan, and shaped it.
I mixed up the sauce, and topped it, and threw it in the oven.
Okay, for the next hour? Smell overload. The entire apartment smelled of awesome meatloaf. I kept checking it every 20 minutes or so to make sure it wasn't burnt, but mainly to get a waft of awesomeness. The hour wasn't over soon enough, and I was presented with this:
And then after some "quality control testing":
Yep. Awesomeness.
Conclusion:
Total Cost: $12 (not including staples like mustard, ketchup, salt, pepper, and what I did include in the cost were the portions, like 1 egg, 1 onion).
Serving Size Cost: $2.38 (Beat THAT, take-out!)
Difficulty: 2 out of 5 (Lots of chopping, mixing, you may not have all ingredients handy)
Taste: 4 out of 5 (It was missing "something", that extra home-made goodness wasn't *quite* there.)
Would I make it again? You bet your ass! It sure as hell can't be good for me, though!
I followed it up with some of the best yogurt i've ever had:
I can only find them at Whole Foods, and they're $.99 each. Totally worth it.
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