World's Second Best Meatloaf

The World's Best is from the New York Times,  We had the second best this week.  I pubbed the recipe before. Meatloaf with Kickass Topping.  

We ate it again this week and it was soooo good.  Changes to the original recipe:  Bread crumbs made from stale baguette soaked in a little milk, and a wee bit of parsley from the garden.  It was still wonderful and we ate the rest in sandwiches for lunch.  I think I like meatloaf sandwiches (cold) as well as meatloaf fresh out of the oven, but it's really a toss up.   I baked potatoes with the meatloaf, and we had them with all the trimmings:  bacon bits, snipped chives from the garden, sour cream and whipped butter.  Plenty of salt and pepper.  I always choose a pretty small potato, but Significant Other opts for a king sized one.  Green beans and salad round out the meal.

 We only eat this a few times a year and I always buy the ground beef (ground daily) at the butcher counter.  I would no more dream of making this with turkey than with octopus.  Sometimes ya just gotta each beef.  Lots of zinc and b-vitamins as well as protein and well, flavor.

The garden is about gone.  Age the last ripe tomato and the last cuke yesterday.  Two more little green tomatoes is all she wrote.  Pulled up the cucumber vines and made pesto from the basil plants.  Parsley about gone, from us.  Lots of mint and rosemary and sage and also oregano.  Must remember to bring the oregano in.  In never lives all winter, but hope does spring eternal.  I have to take cuttings from the coleus and cut the geraniums back and bring them in, too.  Fall chores are about the same as spring chores, without the payoff of color and good eats. 

I think the hummingbirds have migrated.  Can't decide whether to put out one more batch of nectar.  The little birds need to stoke up for their long journey.  It hurts my heart to think of them flying over the Gulf of Mexico during hurricane season.  How do they make it and return to our yard and feeder year by year? 

Flocks of blackbirds massing in the treetops.  Cat is intrigued. 

The cleomes that reseeded themselves are still blooming.  What with the geraniums, coleus, and cleomes, I spent very little on flowers this year.  Trade with friends.  Gardens are for sharing.

The Cheeseparer