Got a buddy on my friends list who’s trying to lose some weight, so I’m posting up occasional low-fat or low-calorie recipes in a gesture of solidarity. This one’s fairly white bread, but I’m in a white bread kind of mood.
This is meat loaf with spinach inside, accented with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese. If you’re a vegetarian, you definitely shouldn’t look at this recipe. This recipe honestly sounded revolting to me when I first heard of it. Actually, it’s very tasty! Takes a little bit of advance notice, since you have to thaw out frozen spinach ahead of time.
Meat Loaf Florentine
1 8-oz can tomato sauce (I like salt-free)
1 t dried oregano
1 t dried basil
1/2 t garlic powder
(Note – you could probably just substitute non-chunky spaghetti sauce for the above if you so chose)
1 lb lean ground beef (10% fat)
2-3 slices whole wheat bread, crumbled
1 egg white
salt and pepper to taste
1 10-oz package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained (press most of the water out, but don’t squeeze it until ti’s too dry.)
1 T grated Parmesan cheese
Preheat oven to 350F
In a small bowl, combine tomato sauce, oregano, basil and garlic powder.
In a large bowl, combine beef, bread crumbs, egg white, salt pepper, and half the tomato sauce mixture. Mix well.
Spread meat on a sheet of waxed paper, forming a rectangle about 8×10 inches.
Spread spinach over half the meat. Top with mozzarella cheese, still covering only half the meat. Fold meat over so that spinach and cheese are inside. Pinch edges of meat to seal.
Place the meat in a shallow baking pan (or on a rack in the pan, if you want to drain more fat). Top with remaining tomato sauce. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.
Bake, uncovered, one hour.
Makes 6 servings, 245 calories per serving.
As far as low-cal, it’s not exactly a dressing-less salad, but it’s not that bad, and it’s very filling. It’s a good way to get some veggies in if you have trouble with that.
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