Bleu Cheese Meatloaf with {Microwave} Potatoes

A few months back my friend, Kristi, posted a recipe - Bleu Cheese Meatloaf!  I cannot, for the life of me, find that post since she changed around her blog (Kristi, you're going to have a million hits from me today looking around for it).  Since I can't do a link back to the post (Kristi, feel free to post it in the comments if you know where to find it better than me!), I will just type the recipe here, plus I want to include an awesome way to make some delicious potatoes and I have a few pictures!

So, bleu cheese is one of those things that people love or hate... generally.  If you're like me and feel kind of 'meh' about it, you like it, don't love it... this is a recipe you should try!!!

Bleu Cheese Meatloaf

What You'll Need:

• 2 lbs. - lean ground beef (we mixed with 1 lb. of super lean and 1 lb. of not so lean)
• 1/2 - Large Onion, or a whole small onion, diced
• 1/2 teaspoon - ground pepper
• 1 teaspoon - salt
• 1 teaspoon - dry mustard
• 1 cup - bread crumbs
• 2 tablespoons - mustard
• 1/4 cup - light sour cream
• 4-6 ounces - bleu cheese crumbles
• Frying Pan
• Baking Pan

Instructions for Meatloaf:

Preheat oven to 350° F.

In a small frying pan, heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add diced onion and fry until the onion is translucent (~15 minutes).

In a large bowl, mix together fried onion, beef, pepper, salt, dry mustard, bread crumbs, mustard, and light sour cream.  Mix well using hands if necessary.  Add bleu cheese and mix in gently.  Pat the mixture down into a baking pan (I used a meatloaf pan, but the actually recipe says 9x13 or 9x9 baking pan).

Bake the meatloaf in the oven until it is no longer pink in the center (1 hour and 5 minutes) or an internal temperature of at least 160°.

Side note on meatloaf: This meatloaf was quite difficult to cut, it was very crumbly, not sure if we didn't pat it down enough before cooking, or if we should have used a large pan to make a flatter meatloaf.  Either way, just a little side note.

Now, on to the potatoes (which, in reality, you'd be preparing while the meatloaf is baking).

Red Potatoes {cooked in the microwave!}

What You'll Need:

• Red potatoes
• Microwave-safe bowl
• Plastic wrap
• Olive Oil
• Salt
• Pepper
• Garlic (optional)
• Frying Pan

Instructions for Potatoes:

Wash potatoes and cut into quarters.  Place potatoes in microwave safe bowl, coat with olive oil and toss around to cover potatoes.  Salt and pepper to taste, toss around again.  Cover the bowl in plastic wrap (make sure bowl is completely covered so no air can escape).

Place in microwave for 4 minutes and 30 seconds, remove from microwave taking caution as bowl may be hot, toss potatoes around in bowl leaving plastic wrap on.  Microwave for another 4 minutes and 30 seconds, remove from microwave, again being extremely careful.  

Uncover, away from face, and poke potatoes with a fork to test doneness.  So far your total cook time has been 9 minutes, which was plenty for potatoes for 2 people (I think we cut up 8-10 small red potatoes) - depending on how many potatoes you are doing, you may need to adjust your cook time, more or less, or do them in 2 batches.

(Optional, but highly recommended) Once desired doneness is achieved, dump entire contents of bowl into frying pan and place the pan over med-high heat.  Turn all the potatoes on cut sides and brown to desired color, repeat with next cut side.  If you've added garlic, you'll end up with some nice little crunchy garlic chips which are delicious!

Serve and enjoy!

So... how was the meatloaf?  It's quite delicious!  The bleu cheese doesn't melt completely so you cut it open to find little pockets of cheese, and it's not overpowering!  I highly, highly suggest you crack open a bottle of red wine to wash this down as the bleu cheese is completely complimented by it.  I've done the potatoes before and loved the just as much this time around :)  Next time though, I think I'm going to brown them a bit more, high heat and sear the crap outta them babies!