Nutty Meatloaf with Cranberry
Meatloaf is one of those dishes you can prepare ahead if you’re doing some meal prepping for the week on Sunday. It’s great warm but even better when it’s cold. You have to put it into your oven 1 hour before you’re planning to serve it, or you can serve it cold later. It is easier to cut pretty slices when it’s cold. You can use the leftovers next day to create a nice lunch with fresh salad, olives, vegetables.
I used dried cranberries. Dried cranberries are very popular in salads, breads, cakes and it gives nice taste to my meatloaf. Most of the commercially produced dried cranberries include added sugar and small amount of vegetable oil. Oil keeps the berries from sticking together. I use both sweetened or unsweetened depending on which I can buy. Sweetened works very well in this meatloaf recipe, don’t worry. The unsweetened gives a bit of sour taste which is also nice so both are possible. But be careful if you have diabetes and check the sugar content every time on the label!
Another ingredient is the pumpkin seed, pumpkin seeds are rich in nutrient and calorie, with high content of healthy fat, protein, dietary fiber and a lot of micronutrients. It delivers remarkable amounts of copper, calcium, potassium, magnesium, iron and vitamin A, E and K. Pumpkin seeds are absolutely keto-friendly. I use just 50 g of it in this recipe.
Nutty Meatloaf with Cranberry
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 medium yellow onion finely chopped
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tsp fresh thyme finely chopped
- 1 tsp fresh rosemary finely chopped
- 50 gram pumpkin seed roasted
- 50 gram pine nut roasted
- 100 gram dried cranberry
- 100 gram bacon minced
- 1 large egg
- 500 gram half-beef half pork minced meat
- 12-14 slices bacon
- ½ tsp pepper I use freshly ground
- ½ tsp salt Only use salt if your bacon is not salty
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C.
- Heat oil in a pan over medium-high heat.
- Add chopped onion and cook 4-5 minutes until tender but not brown, stirring frequently.
- Decrease the heat to medium. Add minced garlic, chopped thyme and rosemary and sauté for 1-2 minutes, stirring. Be careful! Do not burn the garlic because, your food will taste bitter.
- Add onion, garlic, herbs mix, minced bacon to the minced meat.
- Add all remaining ingredients (except bacon slices) to the meat. Season it! I do not use extra salt if the bacon is salty.
- Mix all ingredients very well by hand.
- Lay 6-7 bacon slices (or more if need) to the bottom of loaf cake form close to each other.
- Put the mixture into the loaf cake form. Smooth the top.
- Cover the top with the rest of the bacon slices.
- Put the form into the oven and bake it for 45 minutes, until golden brown.
- After baking leave your meatloaf in the form to rest for 10-15 minutes before serving.Serve it warm or cold, it’s delicious both ways. Serve it with salad or sweet potato mash or steamed vegetables.