My sweet son Walker finally got home from New York this week, and I have, of course, been spoiling him rotten from missing him so much.  I asked him what he would like for dinner the other night, and he replied meatloaf.  This was a little surprising since I haven’t made meatloaf for him in well over a year, but as Corby and I love meatloaf too- that sounded perfect.  It is such an easy recipe, and the best part is that it includes a lot of cheese which is great!  I also decided to try skillet cornbread to go with it- people served a lot of cornbread at the parties we went to on New Year’s day, and I forget how much I like it.  Here is the recipe for skillet cornbread and meatloaf- so tasty!!

Skillet Cornbread

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups stone ground cornmeal (I used yellow)

1 tbsp baking powder

1/2 cup flour

1 tsp salt

4 tbsp melted butter

1 cup buttermilk

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.  In large bowl, mix cornmeal, baking powder, flour, salt, 2 tablespoons of the butter, and 1 cup of buttermilk.  This should be a pourable consistency- if it is too thick for your liking, you can add more buttermilk.  Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter in a large cast iron skillet, but don’t let the butter burn.  Pour the batter into the very hot skillet and cook for about 3o seconds to 1 minute until it bubbles abound the edges of the batter.  Immediately take skillet from burner and put into preheated over to bake until golden brown- about 20 to 25 minutes.  When done- remove cornbread from skillet with the bottom side up onto a serving dish and enjoy!

Marvelous Meatloaf

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef (you can have more depending on how many people you are feeding- up to 1 1/2 lbs I keep the same amount of the ingredients below)

1 cup bread crumbs (I used the Italian Seasoning breadcrumbs just to add flavor)

1 egg

salt and pepper to taste

1 tsp oregano

1 cup ketchup (I usually use 2/3 cup ketchup and then the rest I use steak sauce)

1 cup grated mozzarella cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325.  In a large mixing bowl, add the ground beef, egg, bread crumbs, salt and pepper, oregano, and ketchup.  Mix together- I use my hands- until you form a large ball of the meat mixture.  Put a sheet of tin foil on a baking sheet and roll out the meat mixture until you get a flat rectangle, not too thin, but not too thick either.  Sprinkle most of the grated cheese on top of the rectangle, and then roll up the meat- kind of like a jelly roll with the cheese in the middle.  Bake at 325 for 45 minutes.  At around 40 minutes, I sprinkle the remaining cheese on top of the loaf.

It was all so delicious, Walker asked for it again tonight!