PS, Danita, it's really good to hear your voice here again. As for the meatloaf, I don't measure anything, so it would be hard to put a user-friendly recipe together. But I'll work on it and see if I can at least put together some approximate quantities.

MEATLOAF RECIPE

3 to 4 lbs. of ground round, lean OR turkey
1 egg
1/2 cup Italian, or plain breadcrumbs
Small onion chopped.
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1 small green pepper, diced fine.
1/2 cup of catsup OR a half can of stewed tomatoes, drained well.
salt & pepper to taste.

Instructions...

In a large bowl, place meat, breadcrumbs and all other ingredients and mix well with your hands.

Form into a ball and press to shape into a loaf.

Place on a piece of well sprayed (PAM) aluminum foil. Seal, then place in pan and put into the oven for about two hours on 350*. Check after half an hour and if there is any grease, drain it The leaner the meat, the less grease will need to be drained...
When it looks done, tear top aluminum foil off and spread ketshup on top, and allow to cook for another 15 minutes.

Great with mashed potatoes, and green beans with cold peeled and sliced cucumber and diced onions, mixed with sour cream, Make the night before, the colder the better. Needs pepper too.

chatty, have you ever put jalapenos in your meatloaf, not to the point of overkill, but a tad to taste... ummmm, ummm good.

I put bread and crackers in my meatloaf, and cook with ketchup on top.

My Dad's "secret" recipe for his BBQ hamburgers is much cherished in our family. I've been working for years to try and put ingredients together to match his, because he never told anyone or wrote it down.

The big secret combo appears to be: paprika, chili powder, cumin, worchester sauce and BBQ sauce (I used a cracked-pepper flavoured BBQ sauce) added right into the meat mixture (I use the same BBQ as a glaze on top). He may have put cayenne pepper in as well, but I have a reaction to it, so don't add any. The paprika was the big surprise. We bought a big tin of it in Budapest Hungary last year and I've been throwing paprika into everything (baked beans, spaghetti sauce, beef stew and chili). We've really liked the flavour it adds. So earlier this year I threw it into the meatloaf...it made an amazing difference! Now we think that the paprika might be the missing ingredient.

The only time I've used paprika was to sprinkle it on the top of
deviled eggs and potatoe salad, that's interesting: A spicy
ingredient.

Woops! Potato: just call me a quail!

It is spicy. We buy the sweet paprika (the hot one is too hot for us). After having enjoyed the stuff from Budapest, we can't go back to the stuff we used to buy. So I special-order the Hungarian sweet paprika from an online seasoning store. In fact, this year I'm ordering a few tins of it to give away as Christmas gifts to the people on my list who enjoy cooking.

I wish I knew more about spices and how to use them. Growing up I was not an experimental cook...well, unless you count trying to cook french fries in water...(don't try this at home).

But this sounds interesting. My ex always made his own BBQ sauce. As I recall, he used butter, chili powder, ketchup, Worcestershire's sauce, and garlic poweder...I'm sure there were more ingredients. Bought the only thing he did right...LOL!

Years (how about a lifetime!) ago, when I was working as a live-in nanny, the children's mother bought me a copy of a magazine which had a removable detailed chart of just about every food you can imagine and what spices/herbs to use with those foods. It's an amazing guide, which I still have in sheet protectors in my binder recipe book. That's how I initially learned what goes with what.

But once I became familiar with the basics, I enjoyed experimenting. My greatest tool is my own nose - I sniff whatever's cooking on the stove, then sniff the spice, and if my nose likes the two smells together, I toss the spice in. It works! I have often smelled the simmering food, then smelled a spice and been so turned off by the combo that I know not to throw that particular spice in. You have to have a sensitive nose, which I do and hubby doesn't, so the sniff-method works for me, but not for him.

What an interesting chart. I would love to see a copy of it. Is that possible? If not, may a thousands mustard seeds invade your garlic powder...