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These delicious meatloaf muffins are super kid friendly and easy to portion
control. I make a double batch and freeze for lunches later. The first batch gets GONE with my family. This is from the shrinkingonabudget.com newsletter. Highly recommend it if you have kids.

Cheesy Surprise Meatloaf Muffins
Point Value: 6

Serves 6

Ingredients
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 cup grated carrot
1/2 teaspoon italian seasoning
2 garlic cloves, minced (or 1 teaspoon jarred garlic)
3/4 cup ketchup, divided
1 1/2 lbs extra lean ground beef
1 cup finely crushed saltine crackers (about 20)
3 tablespoons prepared mustard, divided
1 teaspoons brown sugar or Equal
1 teaspoon worcestershire sauce
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
2 large eggs, beaten
(2) sticks 2% String cheese
cooking spray

Directions
Preheat oven to 350°. Heat the olive oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add chopped onion, chopped carrot, dried italian seasoning, and minced garlic; sauté 2 minutes. Take off heat and cool for 5 minutes.

Thoroughly combine onion mixture, 1/2 cup of the ketchup, 2 tablespoons of the mustard, worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper and eggs in a large bowl. After combining wet ingredients, add ground beef and cracker. Incorporate all well, but don't overmix.

Cut each string cheese stick into six equal pieces (total of 12). Combine 1/4 cup ketchup, 1 tablespoons mustard, and brown sugar. Spoon the meat mixture evenly into 12 (medium) muffin tin cups coated with cooking spray (or 6 of the very large muffin cups). "Squish" 1 string cheese piece in each meatloaf muffin so it is at least somewhat covered with meat. Top each evenly with ketchup mixture. Bake at 350° for 25 minutes or until a thermometer registers 160°. Let stand for 5 minutes.

Cooking Tips:

Don't pack the meatloaf tightly into the cups. They will be more tender if only loosely packed.

Note that both the ketchup and the mustard are divided. Use the correct amounts called for in each step.

This will make 12 standard size muffins (2 per serving) and 6 of the jumbo muffins (1 per serving).

An option is to mix 1/2 bbq sauce and 1/2 ketchup where ketchup is called for in the recipe.

These sometimes spill over the muffin tin. Place muffin tins on a lined cookie sheet for easy clean-up.

Picky Eater Tips:
Grate the carrots as the recipe states, but then finely dice the grated carrots as well. Consider making extra ketchup mixture and load their muffin cups with extra sauce.

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