Some nights it is just easiest to throw everything into the oven at once and with one dish have all of dinner ready.  Luke’s meatloaf is one of those dishes but between chunks of cheese and torn pieces of whole wheat bread it was getting to be  higher in calories per serving than we were willing to eat.

With a little creativity I created a variation on his very Italian  meatloaf. After crunching the numbers I discovered the whole loaf was only 1270 calories. That means if you split it into 4 slices it’s 320 calories a piece, or if you slice it into 8 pieces its only 160 calories a piece. The best thing is it’s an all-in-one dinner of veggies, rice, and meat-what more do you need? And for taste? Let’s just say there wasn’t much of a meatloaf left after we were through with it. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

1 lb of 97/3% ground beef

1 C quartered zucchini

1C chopped onion

1 C chopped mushroom

1 C uncooked instant brown rice

1 egg white

2 tsp garlic powder

1 tbsp Italian seasoning

1 tsp Salt

1 tsp Pepper

¼ C Parmesan cheese

½ C to 1 C Hunt’s garlic and herb sauce

Instructions:

1. Chop mushrooms and onion and quartered zucchini

2. Combine the vegetables, uncooked meat, instant brown rice, and 1 egg white

3. Add in spices: garlic powder, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper

4. Place all in a large loaf pan

5. Sprinkle the top with ¼ C of Parmesan cheese

6. Pour the ½ C Hunt’s Garlic and Herb sauce over the Parmesan

7. Place in the oven at 350F for 45 min to an hour

If you let it cool for a little while it will cut much easier into loaf pieces. Because it has large slices of zucchini in it the loaf may fall apart more easily then other meat-loafs but its just as tasty and a whole lot more healthy.