Mini Meatloaf Bites

Hey Peeps! I know, I know, its been a couple days since I last posted! Today I'm blogging from my little ol' home town in Northern British Columbia. I'm up for a quick weekend visit and managed to find some time to get this post together. :)

I made these cute little mini meatloaf bites for our Super Bowl party last weekend, but they would be cute to make for any gathering you're having at your place. You could even make these in regular sized muffin tins for a cute dinner party main as well. Use a mini muffin pan for appetizer size though so people can eat them in a bite or two! I found the inspiration for these on the blog First Look Then Cook but I used my own recipes for meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Have a look at her photos because hers are far prettier than mine - my photos snapped from my iPhone just don't do these justice (it also doesn't help that I had probably consumed more than my fair share of super bowl beverages before attempting to put these together..!!). But they were delish! And super cute.

Meatloaf Bites

Recipe minimally adapted from the Girl Can't Cook

Ingredients:

•  3/4 lb lean ground beef
• 3/4 lb ground pork
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 loves garlic, minced
• 3/4 cup bread crumbs
• 1/2 up hickory bbq sauce (plus extra for brushing after wards)
• 1 tbsp worcestershire
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1 tsp basil
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1 cup parmesan
• mashed potatoes
• bacon bits

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. In a medium sautee pan, sautee onion and garlic with olive oil until softened, about 5 minutes. Set aside to cool.
3. In a large bowl mix together beef, pork and bread crumbs with your hands. Mix in sauteed vegetables, BBQ sauce, worcestershire, egg, basil, salt, peper and parmesan until uniformly mixed. Press scoopfulls of meat mixture into a mini muffin pan. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes or until cooked through.
4. Prepare mashed potatoes (I make mine with butter, whipping cream, salt and pepper. Make them wetter than you normally do, so you can easily pipe them onto the meatloaves).
5. Brush each mini meatloaf with BBQ sauce. Pipe mashed potatoes on top of each mini meatloaf, then sprinkle with bacon bits.

Hope you enjoy this one! We didn't have many leftovers because these were eaten so quickly when I put them out. Enjoy the last day of the weekend!

This post was linked up with Mouth Watering Mondays over at the Sweet Spot. Head over there ASAP to check out all the linky deliciousness going on this week. :)

Happy Cooking my Friends!

Individual Seven Layer Dips with Homemade Salsa

During one of my tireless google searches for cute Superbowl appetizers, I came across these adorable individual seven layer dips on The Girl Who Ate Everything. These are perfect appetizers and party snacks for any kind of get together, especially a game day party or a summer BBQ. They're perfect because they prevent double dipping and you avoid that unappetizing mess that most seven layer dips turn into after a few people have dished themselves out a serving. These have a wow factor to them that make you look like you put a lot more work into them than you did!! So what are you waiting for? Plan on making these for your next party - you and your guests will love them. :)

I only made mine with five layers because I don't like veggies on top of my seven layer dip, but you can add green onions, tomatoes and olives if you want. My layers were as follows:

Refried beans - straight out of the can
Guacamole - this is a good recipe
Sour Cream - mix sour cream with some taco seasoning to taste
Salsa - recipe below
Cheddar Cheese - I used Tillamook Sharp Cheddar, but Pepper Jack would also be delicious
Garnish - I garnished with a tortilla chip

I piped in all of the layers except the salsa and the cheese using a freezer bag with the corner snipped off. Its far less messy and your layers will be prettier!

I am slightly concerned that this salsa recipe isn't going to get the attention it deserves because I've lumped it in with this seven layer dip recipe. But if you only try one thing from this post, try making the salsa - its quick - you can make it in under 5 minutes and it tastes soooo delicious. It is the closest to mexican restaurant salsa I've ever tasted and I LOOOOVVVVEEEEE that stuff. I found this recipe on Mountain Momma Cooks. I only changed the recipe a little because it was honestly such a delicious sounding recipe on its own!!

Speedy Salsa
Recipe minimally adapted from Mountain Momma Cooks

Ingredients:

• 2 14-oz cans of fire roasted, diced tomatoes
• 1/2 small onion, roughly chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 jalepeno, seeded and roughly chopped (leave the seeds in if you like additional heat)
• 1 tsp honey
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• large handful cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
• juice of 1 lime

Method:

1. Combine all ingredients in the large bowl of a food processor and pulse until your salsa reaches the desired consistency. I like mine quite finely minced, but you could pulse it for a very short time for a chunkier salsa.

Yep, thats it!! So easy and flavourful. Do you have a favorite salsa recipe or do you put something unexpected in your seven layer dip? I'd love to hear what you do!

Happy Cooking my Friends!

Super Bowl Recap

I hosted a small Super Bowl gathering at my place tonight. I made enough to feed an army... but isn't that always the way? I'm going to keep this post short because I will go into more details regarding some of these items in posts later this week. :) For now though, just a preview of what is to come this week - just some quick photos I snapped with my iPhone.

 As you can see in the photo above, I made some football themed chocolate dipped strawberries. Not perfect, but they're cute! And easy!

Cute little mini meatloaf bites - mini meat loaf brushed with bbq sauce with creamy mashed potatoes piped on top and then sprinkled with bacon. These were a hit! Recipe will for sure be posted this week, so definitely check back soon.



These were the strawberries, post dip, but pre-decorating. They look beautiful as is, but it was fun to do the extra step just in keeping in theme with the Super Bowl/ football thing!

Then I made some individual seven layer dips (but mine only had 5 layers because I'm fussy and don't really like veggies on top of my dips!! They were delicious. I made salsa (again, recipe will follow this week) and guacamole for these bad boys and topped with some Tillamook Sharp Cheddar and they were a hit.

Also made a couple of other things tonight that I didn't manage to snap some photos of with my iPhone. Made an amazing Reese's Peanut Butter & Oreo Frozen Pie (recipe will be up this week... sooner rather than later because it was sooooo good!) that was an absolute hit!

And the favorite cocktail of the night was Raspberry Beer Cocktail. Check out this easy recipe here.

Oh yeah, and we had some spectacular weather this weekend! So I got out with the dog on Saturday morning at one of our local parks and enjoyed it (yep, that pic is from our walk).

Oh yeah, congrats to the NY Giants on their win! They played hard and it was definitely a nail-biter toward the end of the game... I totally thought New England would pull through for the win, but I guess it wasn't in the cards this year. Sorry to any of you New England fans out there!!

What did you make for your Super Bowl get together? Do you make the same thing every year, or do you try to mix it up?  I would love to hear from you!

Happy Baking my Friends!