The World Table

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Wyoming · Main

Wyoming Elk Meatloaf

  • Intermediate
  • 1 h 40 m
  • roughly 2 of 4 for cost

umami-deep · bright · sweet-edged Leads with savory depth stacked from the pantry’s bass notes, acid holding everything up to the light, trailing gentle sweetness.

Ingredients

  • 800g ground elk
  • 200g ground pork (elk is too lean alone)
  • 1 onion, grated
  • 100g breadcrumbs soaked in 120ml milk
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tbsp Worcestershire
  • 1 tsp thyme
  • Salt and pepper
  • For the glaze: 120ml ketchup, 2 tbsp brown sugar, 1 tbsp cider vinegar

Equipment

Thermometer · Sheet pan · Grater / zester

The skills inside

Shaping by hand

Allergen screen

Found: gluten · dairy · egg · fish

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

  1. Mix the elk and pork with the grated onion, soaked breadcrumbs, eggs, Worcestershire, thyme, salt, and pepper; handle it lightly.
  2. Shape into a loaf on a lined tray rather than packing it into a tin, so the sides brown.
  3. Whisk the glaze and brush half over the loaf.
  4. Bake at 175C for 60-70 min, brushing with the rest of the glaze twice, until 70C internal. 70 min
  5. Rest 15 min before slicing. 15 min

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the technique it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Shaping by hand 85 recipes

  • The pieces match: weighed, or judged against each other rather than by dividing the mass by eye, so that no piece is half again the size of its neighbour.
  • Surfaces are smooth and unbroken with no cracks, tears, or dry patches, and the seams are sealed and sitting underneath.
  • The shape is defined and it holds while the tray waits: it has not slumped, spread, or relaxed back out of its form.
  • Nothing is trapped that should not be: no air pocket where filling should be, no filling breaking through the surface, and no excess flour greying the outside.
  • They finish together in the heat: no piece done while another is still raw, which is the only test that the first mark was met.

Where it goes wrong The dough was worked past its point or shaped without a rest, so it fought back: the pieces spring out of shape on the tray and bake tight, uneven, and torn along the surface.

At the Table

The Pour
Cabernet Sauvignon or Malbec
Also Right
Tempranillo (Rioja Reserva)
From the Taps
Amber ale
Zero-Proof
Sparkling water, make room

Tannin binds to seared protein and fat: each bite softens the wine, each sip resets the palate: the steakhouse equation.

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Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Wyoming Elk Meatloaf Search YouTube: J. Kenji López-Alt on Wyoming Elk Meatloaf A YouTube search for J. Kenji López-Alt and this dish. No affiliation.