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I grew up in a family that believed that meat needed to be cooked until it was like shoe leather, so my memories of meatloaf aren't that great. I hadn't even considered eating it for many years until I read this thread the other day.

So today I decided to give it a try, it was the best meatloaf I had ever eaten, and one of best tasting items that has come out of my sm025 yet.

I didn't follow a recipe exactly, just put some of what I had in: ground chuck, leftover breakfast sausage, onions, garlic, Worcestershire, ketchup, a little leftover rub from yesterdays ribs, breadcrumbs, an egg, salt and pepper. I used a small chunk of hickory and cherry. Turned out smoky, moist and delicious.

My only mistake was not making more, there isn't any left. I'll know better next time.

Thanks for the inspiration.

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If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then, Pags, you must feel quite flattered right now. Seems you got just about everyone talking and thinking about meatloaf.

I followed your recipe to the letter- DANG, that's a lot of meatloaf! Everybody loved it.
Thanks for the inspiration.

Pics here and next thread.

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That looks spectacular and tasty. Nice job.

I am flattered, but I'm just flattering someone else cause it wasn't my idea from the beginning.

I agree...there's a lot of meatloaf there. I make a couple loaves and have one for the future. Plenty of next day sandwiches from each loaf.

You should have seen Mrs. Pags and the kids laughing when I smoked 19 lbs of pork butt. I mean I'm not a restaurateur here, ya know. Big Grin
I just put the meat loaf in the smoker. I cut the recipe in half, and made some changes. I used a combination of Hot, Sweet, and Mild Italian sausage. I cut the amount of "Memphis Rub" down, and used 1 Tbsp of Wild Willy's rub. I figured the extra spice in the Hot and Sweet sausage would make up for this. I added some diced Bell Pepper, and diced Celery, and used Mexican 4 cheese mix. I will use Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce. Most of the changes were simply because I had these things on hand. I will let you know how it turns out. Pictures to follow.
I have a couple meatloaf recipes that I use. But one thing I've found very useful from Alton Brown's Good Eat's meatloaf recipe that I use all the time is to shape it in a loaf pan, but then take it out of the pan for cooking. You get the perfect shape but then all the grease drains off since you're not cooking it in the pan.
Here is the picture of my meat loaf. Since this was the first time I have done this in the smoker, I learned several things. I will not use the Sweet Italian Sausage again, and may just stick to the Hot Italian Sausage. I will use all of the rub seasoning called for, and may replace the Ketchup with Mustard, or Salsa. The Meat Loaf turned out great, but everyone said it was "Sweet", and needed more bite. These comments were coming from people that usually complain about food with a bite. I used a Loaf pan to form the 2 individual loaves, and it worked out great.

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Dakota. Glad it turned out well, and you liked it.

The sausage gives the meatloaf a richer flavor in my opinion. Key is very lean ground beef cause of the sausage. The smoke adds a nice flavor to it also. Meatloaf is just a natural for these smokers, but you don't hear much about it...cause folks just don't think of meatloaf as barbecue. If they only knew.
quote:
Originally posted by Sgt Rock:
Is the ketchup and the Big Bob Gibson's Red Sauce added to the mixture before it goes on the grill or smeared on after


I'll defer to the OP, but there was this line between a couple of photos:

quote:
Let the meat loaf rest for 20 minutes and coat the top/sides of the meat loaves with Big Bob Gibson’s Red (or sauce of your choice). Here coated before their visit back to the smoker:
Both. Ketchup and Big Bob Gibson's Sauce goes into the mix. Then the Sauce goes onto the meatloaf later and back into the smoker to set the sauce.

Lately, I've not used the ketchup but have gone with barbecue sauce.

Also, use whatever barbecue sauce you'd like. Last week I used Sweet Baby Ray's, and it turned out very well.

Next day, take the meatloaf, lightly grill the meat slices then add it to a couple slices of bread with mayo. Great grilled meatloaf sandwiches.
Oh gawd! Everytime this post resurfaces I get a hankering for some smoked meatloaf. Sunday dinner this weekend for sure. I just need to remind myself that my last two batches have come out a little salty. I think I need to lay off one of the rubs I was using.

Everytime I make it, I think to myself...I could open a restuarant with this as the main dish... Or at least a food truck.

Meatloaf sandwiches
Meatloaf grilled cheese
Meatloaf tacos
Meatloaf and Mac n' Cheese
Meatloaf salad

Million dollar idea right there!

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