Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Mr. Hawthorne Makes Meatloaf.

I refused to cook last night. Well, OK, it's not like I refused. I wasn't asked to cook. It wasn't assumed that I was going to cook. It was just made public by me that I wasn't cookin'. Period. I was chillin'. So's as Mr. Hawthorne cannot miss a meal, he took it upon himself to cook last night. Sometimes, it just ain't worth it for me to chill. Mr. Hawthorne had bought a huge honkin' mess of hamburger meat and turkey meat on sale the other day and it's one of those things you buy in the morning and you need to cook by lunchtime. So, just let me give you a play-by-play of my chillin' evening.
First, Mr. Hawthorne chopped up some green peppers.
Then he started cutting up bread WITH MY MEAT CLEAVER. Sheesh.
I told him to add the milk to the bread and let it soak a bit, which he did.
Then he started on his meatloaf mixture: In the bowl on the right I believe is Lipton Onion Soup Mix and the chopped green peppers. Guess he didn't want to go through the monkey business of chopping real onions. And he's getting ready to add in the meats.
Ketchup went on next. And this looks like a volcanic eruption. Believe me, that was the nicest thing I could say about it.
Next, the milk-soaked bread pieces went in.
And he mixed it all up by hand, which, really, is the only way to do it. No bling was involved in the mixing. No sunglasses on the back of the head. No bleached, spiked hair. No piercings. No homies named Mustard and Dirty P. (which I think must refer to some parole officer issue.) No pinball machines, fooz ball tables, pool tables, or other such buffoonery in the 'rents' basement apartment. And no ass-holiness, ass-hattery, or douchery involved.
More Lipton Onion Soup Mix. Now usually, when we make a meatloaf, we use Hunt's Seasoned Meatloaf sauce. Looked high and low. I was out of the sauce. Then Mr. Hawthorne said to me: "Imonna make something. You may want to blog this." That was so funny to me, since he barely reads my blog. OK he reads it, but it's sporadic reading. And I'm sure he doesn't read it all. And most of the time he gets irritated when I hold up the serving of the meal because I'm photographing the food ... and photographing the food ... and photographing the food. So when he said what he said, I immediately wrote it down so I would be able to precisely blog about it tonight. I think there might have been 3 times since I started this blog that he's actually said something like that. Anyways, what he's making here which he wanted to make sure I'd record for posterity is Mr. Hawthorne's (Better Than Hunt's) Meatloaf Sauce.
First, the base. Ketchup. I really like that shot. The dangling ketchup from on high. And, dare I say it, the ketchup nipple below. Heh. Can't wait to see the anticipated increase in Feedjit visitors now when they start googling really weird shit and my blog shows up because I mentioned a ketchup nipple. There are sick people out there.
Several good grinds of pepper. And salt.
A few shots of Extra Light Bertolli olive oil. I like Bertolli's Extra Light for most applications, although I always have at least a half dozen other types of olive oils on hand.
Granulated garlic.
Onion powder.
Home-grown, home-dried, home-ground hot pepper. I tasted right about this point. And it was GOOOOOD. Mr. Hawthorne said, "No, it needs something else." Then I looked in horror as he added Steak Sauce. I have an aversion to steak sauce. I am biased and prejudiced against steak sauce. I have been accused before of being a food purist, and by some with jaded palates, a food snob. My feelings here are that steaks are steaks in their own rights. A proper steak doesn't need anything. A bottled steak sauce violates a steak. It masks the flavor of the steak and replaces it with chemicals. A steak is a steak is a steak. And that's my story and I'm stickin' to it and if anyone disagrees with me then they're plainly wrong.
As I recoiled in horror, he poured in maybe 1 tablespoon of the steak sauce. And you know what? I tasted again. Stuck my finger right in and tasted it. It was absolutely no difference from the sauce before he put in the steak sauce.
When I got to the point in this post about the steak sauce, I knew I needed to take this picture of the steak sauce with my son's drawing (since it was right there on the counter under the steak sauce), as a base. It's a drawing of an AR-15. Scroll down there and look at the picture of the AR-15. Youngest Hawthorne was drawing his from memory. When he was a wee lad, he could draw every type of fighter jet the Navy had. Since we live near Norfolk, VA. it was S.O.P. to see numerous jets flying over our house on their way to perhaps Stumpy Point, NC, a Navy Bombing Range, or to other nefarious locations. Oh, but I digress. It's because I don't want to go into what happened next Ok. Deep breath. The meatloaf had been in the oven for about 40 minutes And Mr. Hawthorne took it out to drain the grease and whined for me to come over and help. I do not help. I am chillin'. . . . . . Thirty minutes later, he whines and moans yet again for me to help him. So's I oblige. I'm holding the spatula against the bottom of the meatloaf while he holds the pan and pours the grease out. Did he choose the grease bottle to pour it into? Nooo. He was pouring it into a measuring cup to dirty it up first, that I would have to later empty into the already, pre-greased and pre-dirtied grease bottle. The grease is draining away very nicely. Then he keeps telling me to put the spatula up in the middle of the meatloaf. Everything's going fine with it at the bottom of the loaf. But he insists I move the spatula up to the middle. So, all right already. Heh. Look at that. Most people spell both those words wrong.
I raise the spatula to the middle and to keep the meatloaf in the pan of sloshing grease I have to press harder. Mr. Hawthorne does not rise to the task and give me the proper support and equal reactivity. So physics happened.
And then shit happened. The Meatloaf Mishap. I'm kinda thinking this is all pretty funny because, heck, what else can you do? Just laugh and get on. But, Mr. Hawthorne has totally copped a 'tude about this which I really don't unnerstand because it's totally an accident, but I guess sometimes people feel the need to blame someone. And ladies/women out there who have to deal with this sort of thing, I ask you: Why the hell is he bitchin' so damn much when he FREAKIN' KNOWS he's NOT gonna clean it up? No way. No how. It's a given that this is MY MESS. No question about it. He knows it. He silently deigns it. I know it. I do it. Thing is, he sooo knows I'm gonna do it. I know he would never besmirch himself so much as to do it. Certain things are given in relationships. You don't have to like 'em. But you do have to deal. And I dealt last night. But like I said earlier, some things you just have to laugh about. And not make a big deal about. Deal with it by NOT dealing with it. Works for me.
This is so typical. He rescues the frickin' loaf. And puts his "Imonna make something. You may want to blog this." damn sauce on the meatloaf.
Let's just take a quick look at MY DINNER.
Left side: shards of glass meatloaf crap grease
Right side: about 1/4" meatloaf joos
And here's the meatloaf.
Now, you'll just have to bear with me. My meatloaf totally wanted to make love to the camera.
Uhhh ... Nancey? You know my dentition. Who took a bite outta that meatloaf?
What does this meatloaf piece look like? It's a man's head facing to the right. He's got a pointy chin, an open mouth, and a great big nose.
Spaniel running at me.
Take your own Rorschach here. I know what I see.

6 comments:

Sara said...

This looks great - my husband requests meatloaf all the time, I usually make the barefoot contessa's turkey meatloaf. I am impressed that Mr. Hawthorne makes such a nice meatloaf!

Hairball T. Hairball said...

It does look like a tasty meatloaf but, what a mess to have to clean up on your stove!

Oh well, at least nobody was hurt by the broken dish.

Marilyn said...

Oh my, what a mess. But still funny. As you said, what ya gonna do?

Marion Walsh said...

Hey Rosie, last time I had a pyrex pan blow up I got a new kitchen floor out of it. Make Mr. H. try again.

Michigan Lori said...

Hey Rosie,
I am glad neither of you got cut, but what a mess you have to clean up!!!!

Kathy said...

At least you can look forward to cold meatloaf sandwiches tomorrow, which is, in my opinion, the only function of meatloaf.