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My Own Meat Loaf

A savory loaf made from ground beef, pork sausage, eggs, bread crumbs, onions, and tomato sauce, topped with bacon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

My Own Meat Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Shape the loaf

  1. In a large bowl, mix together the hamburger, pork sausage, beaten eggs, salt, pepper, tomato pulp or hot sauce, soft bread crumbs, and diced onions until well combined.

  2. Shape the mixture into a loaf and place it in a baking dish.

  3. Lay strips of bacon on top of the meatloaf.

Bake

  1. Bake in the preheated oven, basting with tomato juice or water until cooked through and browned.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Pork + tomatotop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Hamburger
Provides the main meaty body and structure of the loaf.
Pork sausage
Adds fat and flavour, keeping the loaf moist as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the meat and crumbs together so the loaf holds its shape when sliced.
Soft bread crumbs
Absorb juices and help keep the loaf tender rather than dense.
Diced onions
Add moisture and savoury sweetness as they soften during baking.

The step that matters

Shaping and mixing the loaf. Overmixing the meat compacts its proteins and yields a tough, dense loaf, so mix only until combined. Packing the loaf too tightly also makes it dense and can trap fat, so shape it gently.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, egg, pepper, tomato, bread):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, egg, pepper, tomato, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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