So the other night it was my turn to cook dinner.    Knowing I had to use some ground turkey so it didn’t go bad, I had to figure out what I was going to make.    Looking through my cupboards I noted I was running a bit high on ‘Italian’ versions of things.   

In the fridge was also a pound of Jimmy Dean Italian sausage that never got used for pasta and was approaching its expiration date as well.

Never tried a meatloaf with sausage.    Got strange looks when I suggested making meat loaf with it.    But I don’t let that stop me.

It came out really good.    Tasted a lot like meatballs.    I followed the recipe on the back of the meat-loaf seasoning pack, substituting what I had.

1 pound ground meat (I used turkey…which is more bland than beef, so you may need to season it more if you use beef).

1 pound Jimmy Dean Italian Sausage

(together that constitutes the two pounds of meat it calls for)

2 Eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup spaghetti sauce   (in lieu of the traditional 1/2 cup of ketchup)

1 1/2 cups Italian Style Bread Crumbs    (the recipe actually called for 1/4 cup but I never can get it to hold its shape right with less than this amount though… maybe high altitude or something…adjust as needed)

Just mix all that stuff together real good.    Then form it into a loaf, or be like me and press it into a loaf pan.

Top it off with more of the spaghetti sauce  (my leftover will be pizza sauce tonight as I didn’t use the full jar.)

Bake in a 375 degree oven for an hour or so until the meat is fully cooked.

Sprinkle some parmesan cheese over the top for the last five minutes or so of baking.   Or some mozzarella maybe… I was going to put that on half of it for myself, but didn’t feel like grating any.

Serve warm.   I paired mine with some mashed potatoes and green beans.    Nice thing about this one is that between the turkey and sausage, the meatloaf wasn’t swimming in juices when I pulled it out of the loaf pan.    Gabe likes that soggyness, I don’t.  

Tasty.    Indeed the left-overs will likely find their way onto the pizza as well.   Just take a slice, crumble it up, and sprinkle it on the pizza.    (I tend to do home-baked pizza more than buy it these days… better ingredients, better pizza, papa shaun.)