Why Not Zoidberg Meatloaf?

No, it’s really not as hard as it looks.

Coincidentally, the same day we ordered the Futurama boxed set was the same day I decided to make Zoidberg Meatloaf. Because why not Zoidberg? The real question you may be asking is, “Why meatloaf”? For one, over the last week I’ve had so much ‘garbage food’ i.e.: over-processed, preservative laden, empty calorie sugary crap that I just can’t stomach one more forkful. I do enjoy eating other things besides the usually sweet treats I present you every week. For two, Zoidberg is a crustaceous alien being who, being flat broke, essentially survives on other people’s garbage. Three, meatloaf generally looks like a bunch of garbage shaped into an edible mystery loaf. What even goes into meatloaf?

In this case, surprisingly good things. Ground beef, veggies, quality seasonings, and imitation crabmeat. Crabmeat? Yes, crabmeat. It only makes sense in Zoidberg’s case. Ready? Let’s go.

Gamers, grab your mats:

Meatloaf:

• 2 pounds ground beef, preferably good quality
• 1 medium onion, or about 1/2 cup
• 1/2 cup sweet peppers
• 1 egg
• 8 ounces canned diced tomatoes in juice – since we’re going a little on the spicy side I used the kind with jalapenos included.
• 1 cup roasted garlic seasoned bread crumbs
• 2 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• imitation crabmeat – I grabbed two 8 oz. packs to be on the safe side. Also they were on sale and NOMNOMCRAB

Topping:

• 2/3 cup Frank’s Sweet Chili Sauce
• 2 tablespoons ketchup

NOTE: If you really can’t tolerate a smidgeon of heat, sub out the sweet chili sauce for a half and half mixture of ketchup and cocktail sauce. This would probably give you a better, redder Zoidberg color.

Golly, guess who forgot to photograph the ketchup. Hmmm.

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.

Dump your ground beef in a large mixing bowl and set aside. Finely chop your onion and add to the meat bowl.

Taken literally a split second before the knife fell out of the onion. I do not misuse the word ‘literally’ here.

Attempt to finely chop 1/2 cup of sweet peppers. For me, this was about 7-8? It was late. We were playing Agricola with friends at the same time. I forgot. Forgive me. Add sweet peppers to meat bowl.

My derpy self only chopped yellow peppers. Oh well, it’s still color, right?

Measure out 8 ounces (1 cup) of the diced tomatoes and juice. You know they don’t come in easy one-time-use cans. Of course not. Add to meat bowl.

Veggies. Yesssssssssssss.

Add in 1 cup of bread crumbs. I initially forgot to double the amount I needed since I was using so much meat and ended up adding only 1/4 cup at a time because WHAT A DOPE.

Gee, self, why is the meat a goopy mess? I HAVE NO IDEA.

Add pepper…

a.k.a. the best seasoning in the history of ever.

And salt.

Kinda looks like a lot, right? Don’t worry.

Oh, yeah, and an egg. crack that bad boy right into the bowl.

I am apparently incapable of cracking an egg one-handed while taking a picture. Here you go.

Mix well. It’s okay if you start mixing it all together with a wooden spoon but you’ll eventually want to use your hands to combine everything into a fragrant meat-lump.

This smells so divine. Really.

Turn the giant meat-lump out onto a baking pan. I used a 16″ pizza pan out of convenience. Smack your meat-lump into submission until it resembles this:

For advanced chefs, why not shape the meatloaf into a more aesthetically pleasing 3/4 view? I did not. It was like 10pm at this point.

Cover with imitation crab meat. If you didn’t know, these are really thin sheets rolled into a sort of layered log. Unroll and cover. You may need to cut off some excess with your kitchen scissors. Place four ‘tentacles’ (intact crabmeat rolls) over the mouth area.

A little overlap on the sheets is a good thing.

NOTE: For next time, I’d probably turn the crab rolls over to the white side and use a half and half mixture of ketchup and sweet chili sauce for better color accuracy.

Mix two tablespoons of ketchup into the sweet chili sauce (or use one of the half and half mixtures recommended) and cover the meatloaf.

Unfortunately, there’s not much to be done about the runoff. Probably should place the meatloaf on some greased aluminum foil next time for easier cleanup. Whoops.

Good enough? Good enough. Bake meatloaf at 375 degrees F for one hour.

What a gorgeous mess. Like I said, aluminum foil next time.

Transfer meatloaf to a large serving dish. This is best done by using two spatulas. Meatloaf is thankfully rather solid. To make Zoidberg, add two onion slices for eyes. The facial outlines were achieved by breaking an onion straw almost in half. Use concentrated black gel food coloring on a wooden skewer to outline the onion eyes, draw on pupils, and color the facial lines. Perfect!

Zoidberg Approved!

And from an angle…

I can not WAIT to slice into this but it’s like 1am and it’s my fault and I hate myself and AUGH.

I’ll just leave this here. Are you not entertained?? I’m excited to get our boxed set next week and rewatch every episode. Ideally in a binge session. Bring it on.

Cheers,

Leisel

Coming up next: Y’know… I really did not think that far ahead this time. Let me get back to you on that. I’ve had a really hella late night.

EDIT: Coming up next: Captain America Fruit Pizza (see also: I found my SuS Excel posting schedule)