Mini Meatloaves-Italian Style

I found tonight's main dish on a blog, Gourmet Meals for Less, and I knew that Scott liked meatloaf so I thought I would give it a try. 

Marvelous Mini Meatloaves-
makes 12 meatloaves

lb. extra-lean ground beef (1.69)
1 pkg. (6 oz.) Chicken flavored stuffing mix (use the cheapest you can find)
1 cup water

and choose from your favorite of the following combinations:

1 tsp. italian seasoning, spaghetti sauce, shredded mozzarella
2 tsp. chili powder, chunky salsa, mexi-cheese
1 tsp. garlic powder, bbq sauce, cheddar cheese

Directions: Preheat oven to 375°. Mix meat, stuffing mix, water and preferred seasoning until well blended. 
Press into 12 muffin cups sprayed with cooking spray. Make indentation in center of each with back of spoon; fill each evenly with spoonful of preferred sauce Bake 30-40 min. or until meatloaves are done (160°F). Top each meatloaf with sprinkle of cheese; bake 5 min. or until melted. Let stand 10 min.

Make Ahead and Freeze:  Bake meatloaves as directed. Remove from muffin cups; cool completely. Place in single layer on baking sheet; freeze 1 hour. Transfer to airtight container. Store in freezer up to 1 month. Thaw in refrigerator, and then reheat in 375°F-oven 20 min. or until heated through.

Here's what I started with:  (we went with the Italian Seasoning, spaghetti sauce and mozzarella cheese)

Here's how I did it:

#1 I preheated the oven to 375 degrees.

#2 I put the hamburger meat in a bowl.

#3 I added the stuffing to the hamburger meat.

#4 Next, I added 7-8 good dashes of Italian seasoning and 1 cup of water.  Then, I mixed it altogether.

#5 I sprayed a muffin pan with Pam and then stuffed each pan with the meat.

#6 The directions said to use the back of the spoon to push a little hole into the meat but I couldn't get a big enough hole so I used the lid of my seasoning jar to make a bigger hole into it.

#7 Then I scooped spaghetti sauce into the indentation and spread it across the top.

#8 Into the oven for about 40 minutes.

#9 Once the loaves were cooked, I pulled the pan out and topped each loaf with some mozzarella cheese.  Then, back into the oven for another 5-6 minutes.

Once finished, I pulled them out of the oven and let them sit for about 5 minutes.

The Finished Product:

Review:

This was such a neat idea and it was really, really good.  We started out with 12 mini meatloaves and we ended the meal with 2.  Even Kanin thought that this was great and that is saying A LOT.  I wasn't really sure how it was going to taste with the spaghetti sauce and mozzarella cheese but it was so good.

This is the type of meal, too, in which if some of the people in your family like Mexican and some like Italian then it would be easy to make 6 of each.  Plus, I love how the recipe tells you how to make ahead and freeze, too.

If I could have changed one thing, I think next time I wouldn't get a chicken flavored stuffing.  I think, instead, I would look to see what other varieties there were.  For me, there was still just a hint of the taste of stuffing instead of traditional crumbled up crackers or I guess you could even use just bread crumbs as a binding.
Either way, we will definitely be having this meal again!

I served this meal with a can of succotash and parsley potatoes.

Hope you enjoy!
April