Bottoms-up Smoked Meatloaf

Recipe

Jul 16

Written By SirPorkalot (John)

Meatloaf is one of those familiar childhood dishes to most of us, so what happens when you take it to the next level?

You get this;
A Cherry Wood Smoked Meatloaf, covered with a Garlic Jack cheese and has a caramelized onion crust

Ingredients

2 lbs Ground Beef (I used Grass Fed)
- 1 lb Ground Pork
- 1 Onion (cut into slivers)
- 1 cup (crushed) Tortilla chips/Corn Chips/Crackers (I used GF Crackers because my wife has a gluten intolerance)
- 1 cup mayonnaise
- 1 Tbs crushed garlic
- 1 Tbs Q-Salt
- 1 wedge Garlic Monterey Jack cheese (1/2 grated to go in the meatloaf and other 1/2 grated to go on top)
- 1 square foil pan (9x9x2)

Instructions

Combine the first 5 ingredients and half the cheese. After this is mixed, put into foil pan even it out. Now spread the onions out across the top of the meatloaf and then season over the onions liberally with the salt and some fresh cracked pepper. (optional) .

You should end up with something like this.

You want to take something flat and mash the onions down, so they sink down into the meatloaf a little. I used a small cutting board. This is an important step, because this will become the bottom of your meatloaf and if the onions are pressed into the meat well, they will adhere better later.
Cover pan tightly with a piece of foil.

Grill/Smoker Set-up

I used my Weber Performer with charcoal baskets. In the bottom of the charcoal basket I added some Cherry wood chunks and then once the charcoal was hot in the chimney, I added the hot coals on top and set the charcoal baskets on either side of grill (indirect cooking). I targeted 250-275F during most of the cook, higher towards the end.

Once the grill is set-up, you want to place the meatloaf on the center of the grill (you can leave foil on top, or remove it so the top gets some color & smoke, but you will have to put foil back on before moving to next step) and let it cook for about 20 minutes. This will cause the meatloaf to shrink away from the sides of the pan just a little, so when you do the next step....flip it over, so it is Bottom-up, the pan will slide off easier.

Just prior to flipping over, notice how meat has pulled away from pan a bit

Bottoms-up

Make sure foil is tight on pan (pan will be hot) very carefully flip the pan over, so that the side you foiled is now laying on the grill. Carefully remove the foil from around the edges of the foil pan, and carefully lift off the foil pan.