My mother’s meatloaf is baked with strips of bacon on top of it and while I like the smokey flavor that imparts, the bacon itself isn’t really all that toothsome. It’s just ends up being flaccid ketchup-y stuff that I usually toss.
Recently at a friend’s house I was served some smoked Gouda cheese which is not something I often have but it was seriously smokey and I had the idea that adding that to the meatloaf would really rock. It didn’t. Oddly, smoke flavor is very delicate and the hour or so of baking it pretty much destroys the smokiness of it but the real issue is that the cheese on the top turned into, well, let’s just say it would not have been out of place on the sandal of a charioteer in Ancient Rome. Apparently Gouda is not a melting cheese. Who knew?
So I decided to fix the problem by grinding the whole fucking mess up in a food processor and reimagine it as paté. I added an egg and threw it into a paté contraption I have because a certain horse-riding enforcer of the law just HAD to have it and then left it behind when he moved to the continent because it weighs 478 pounds. This is the first time I’ve used it in 11 years.
It was awful. I ate it but I’ll eat anything. Almost.
I’ve made pate meatloaf with chicken livers in the mix and it is delicious. Love the pate pan. Smoked Gouda not always so gooda.