Meatloaf isn’t pretty. Let’s just get that out on the table. It’s so ugly, in fact, that I couldn’t stop giggling while taking these pictures. All I could think about were those silly post cards with retro pictures of jello molds and other hideous foods from the 1950s. But you know what? After one bite you forget allll about what it looks like. Even the smell is enough to change your mind. This loaf is insane (in a good way).
If you’re not into loaves of meat, I found that this mix makes a pretty excellent Thai turkey burger as well. To taste test the seasoning I had to cook a small dollop in a skillet and it turned into a little mini turkey burger. Quite delicious. Pop one of those onto a Hawaiian roll and you’re golden. Or, you can do it in meatball form.
I covered my mouth-wateringly delicious (yet ugly) meatloaf with a spicy Sriracha glaze. If you don’t like spicy, you can use a jar of sweet chili sauce (not spicy as the name may imply) or even a sweet and sour sauce. But, you know, I had to have my sriracha!
Oh, and this makes a pretty big loaf. It can easily be halved if needed.
Thai Turkey Meatloaf
thai turkey meatloaf
Servings 8Ingredients
LOAF
- 2 lbs ground turkey ($5.36)
- 4 cloves garlic ($0.32)
- 3-4 whole green onions ($0.38)
- 2 inches fresh ginger ($0.30)
- 3 Tbsp soy sauce ($0.18)
- 1 tsp toasted sesame oil ($0.19)
- 2 large eggs ($0.46)
- 1.5 cups cooked jasmine rice ($0.26)
GLAZE
- 1/2 cup brown sugar ($0.12)
- 2 Tbsp ketchup ($0.05)
- 2 Tbsp sriracha sauce ($0.17)
- 1 Tbsp rice vinegar ($0.04)
Instructions
- Place the ground turkey in a large bowl. Slice the green onions and mince the garlic. Add the onion and garlic to the bowl along with the soy sauce and sesame oil. Peel the ginger and grate it directly into the bowl using a fine cheese grater. Mix everything together well.
- Add the eggs and cooked jasmine rice (white rice will work in a pinch). Mix everything together thoroughly. Line a baking sheet with foil and spray with non-stick spray. Place the meat mixture onto the baking sheet and shape it into a loaf.
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Once preheated, place the loaf inside and bake for 30 minutes. While the loaf is baking, mix together the sriracha glaze. In a small bowl stir together the brown sugar, ketchup, sriracha, and rice vinegar.
- After it has baked 30 minutes, remove the loaf from the oven and spoon half of the sriracha glaze over top. Bake for an additional 30 minutes. Spoon the remaining glaze over top and bake for a final 15 minutes. A meat thermometer placed in the center of the loaf should read 160 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Allow the loaf to rest for ten minutes before slicing.
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Nutrition
Step By Step Photos
This is the ground turkey that I used. It is 85% lean, 15% fat. The store did have a leaner ground turkey but it was about a dollar more per pound and I figured the fat would help keep the loaf moist. If you prefer the leaner turkey, it should also work just fine.
Place the ground turkey in a bowl and add the sliced green onions, minced garlic, peeled and grated ginger, soy sauce, and sesame oil. Mix it all up very well.
Next add two eggs and the cooked jasmine rice. White or brown rice will work in a pinch if you don’t have jasmine rice, but just know that jasmine rice does add some flavor. Mix everything up really well again.
And this is your final Thai turkey mix. You can make it into burgers or meatballs at this point if you don’t want a loaf. It’s pretty wet and sticky, so if you’re making burgers, make sure to use some oil or non-stick spray.
If you’re going the meatloaf route, cover a baking sheet with foil and then spray with non-stick spray. Shape the mixture into a loaf. I prefer to bake meatloaf on a baking sheet rather than a loaf pan because it allows extra moisture to drain away. Loaf pans hold it all in and they often get soupy on the bottom.
Bake the loaf in a 375 degree oven for 30 minutes. This is what it looks like so far. Not so pretty, but you can see how some of that moisture is draining away.
While the loaf is baking during that first 30 minutes, mix up the sriracha glaze. Stir together the brown sugar, ketchup, sriracha, and rice vinegar.
Spoon about half of the glaze over the meat loaf and spread it all over the sides. Bake for an additional 30 minutes.
After a full 60 minutes of baking, my meatloaf had already exceeded the safety mark of 160 degrees internal temperature. I still had some glaze left so I spooned it over top and baked it for 15 more minutes.
And then it had a nice thick, sticky sriracha glaze! …smells SO good. The meatloaf should lift easily from the baking sheet. The glaze that dripped onto the baking sheet was burned, but none of the meatloaf or glaze on the meatloaf were even close to being burned.
I garnished with a few more sliced green onions and I just happened to have some fresh pineapple that I cut up that morning.
Make sure to allow the meatloaf to rest for at least ten minutes before slicing. This allows the steam pressure to reduce, which keeps the moisture in the loaf instead of driving it out.
Hi Beth! Thank you for sharing all your wonderful recipes. Since I discovered you website, I’ve been using a lot of your recipes to help with my family’s budget. I’ve been trying to figure out how to cut back on grocery spending. I used to spend about $700 per month for groceries. I’ve been using your recipes for the last three weeks making weekly trips to grocery store and spending $120-$130. By the end of next week, I could say that I’ve been able to save $180 in the last month. WIth that being said, will this recipe work if I use a muffin tin? How could I keep the moisture under control? Add more rice? Thanks again!!!
Wow, Cheryl! That’s some great savings!! I’m so happy I’ve been able to help. ❤️ I think you could definitely do this in a muffin tin and since they’re smaller, I don’t think there would be too much moisture pooling. I do a vegetable meat loaf in a muffin tin and it’s not too bad, despite the vegetables containing a lot of moisture! The baking time will probably be shorter, since they’re smaller, as well.
If I don’t have sriracha in pantry. Do you have a suggestion for a replacement.
I had to use up some ground turkey, so I turned to this recipe last night. Halved the quantities, used plain white rice instead of jasmine, and my soya sauce gave the loaf a very dark colour indeed – but it was still extremely delicious. Thank you!!
Beth, do you have a suggestion for swapping out the white rice? Really trying to cut calories and I’m not sure what I should use instead. Thanks for any suggestions, love all your recipes!
You can leave it out, but the loaf will just be a slightly different texture and might not hold together quite as well. That starch acts as a good binder. There are other starches you can use, but they’ll all have the same calorie load. ;)
I made this last night. I’ve got gestational diabetes, and have found rice sends my glucose numbers skyrocketing. I swapped the rice for riced cauliflower, and the loaf held together well, and tasted wonderful, without affecting my numbers.
Awesome, thanks for sharing the results!!
Beth you did it again…made my day!! I made this for dinner last night and we all loved it!! Even my picky children!! Now the only thing I did was I added 1 tbsp of Epicure Asian Stir-Fry spices (a Canadian based company). Well thanks again for coming up with these great recipes!!
Thank you so much for guiding me through my first efforts making meat loaf. It came out so yummy. My boyfriend loved it. It held together great. I followed the recipe exactly except I used 1.5 lbs ground turkey and .5 lb ground pork. Also I used leftover cooked rice that had been sitting in our fridge for days.
This one was a bit of a mixed bag for me, though more good than bad.
The good:
Oh wow, is this delicious. I grew up eating the America’s Test Kitchen Family Cookbook meatloaf, which follows a similar recipe, so when I saw this involved a pan-baked meatloaf with a ketchup/brown sugar glaze, I knew I’d like it. Plus, it’s got the meat/ginger/green onion/soy combo of gyoza, which can’t be beat.
It wasn’t too hard or expensive to make, and, like I mentioned, it’s delicious.
The not-so-good:
Unfortunately, though I followed the recipe to the letter, my loaf didn’t have as much structural integrity as yours–the best it could do was a sort of thick meat pancake. This changed the baking process quite a bit. On top of that, I goofed and accidentally poured all of the glaze on in the first intermission–not the end of the world by any means, but a bit of a mistake.
I’m not sure why my loaf lacked the structural integrity yours had. Maybe it needed another egg? Maybe I didn’t believe in it hard enough?
Whatever the case, it was definitely tasty, and I’m sure I’ll make it again, though I’d like to figure out why mine was so flimsy this time around.
Hahah, it sounds like you believed in it plenty! :) If the meat mixture is too soft to form into a loaf, that’s usually because it has too much moisture (so an egg would probably make it worse). Perhaps your rice had more moisture than mine? Or maybe it was due to that weird turkey in a tube that I used? Not sure. If I could have actually seen yours with my own eyes, I’d probably be able to help more. :P
Thanks for the feedback! I’ll keep it in mind the next time I make this.
Hey,
You might want to try wrapping the tinfoil around the shape of the meatloaf for the original bake so that it keeps the shape.
Then move the foil back for the rest of the baking and glazing process.
SOOOOOO delicious! I had a lb of ground pork on hand, so I used half pork and half turkey. I only used half the sriracha since my hubby isn’t a fan of too much spice. He declared this to be his “preferred meatloaf recipe”…and ate 3 helpings. My friend who recommended it said that it tastes like the inside of a potsticker…spot-on!
I chose this recipe because I had some company that is allergic to beef and meatloaf feeds a nice crowd without breaking the bank. I followed the recipe to the T and it was a HUGE hit. It was by far the best turkey meatloaf I have ever had, and my company agreed eagerly. This will become a common dinner in my household, in all of its variants.
I made these last week with one change. I used 1/2 turkey and 1/2 chicken because that`s what I had. I used the lined cookie sheet but instead of shaping into a loaf, I spread the meat mixture as I would a brownie batter, cut the cooking time to 30 minutes. At 15 minutes I topped with sauce. Once cooled, I cut just like I would brownies because they fit my homemade square hamburger buns. I got 12 square burgers. My hubby and kids loved them so much that I made another batch!! They freeze wonderfully!! I freeze them on a lined cookie sheet for about 2 hours, then I wrap them individually in saran wrap then place all in a gallon sized freezer bag. Great for quick dinner. Microwave for 2 minutes, serve with salad or steamed vegetables. My kids love them as an afternoon snack cut up and eaten on crackers. Best Thai recipe I’ve used in a while!!! Will being using this recipe often! Thank You Beth!
That’s such an awesome idea! Thanks for sharing it!
I did this! It worked beautifully and made it so much easier to portion for meal prep, not to mention being a lot faster to bake!
This was a very pleasant surprise. Thanks so much for this recipe. It’s a keeper!
I just made this and I love it. It’s a keeper. Thank you for the recipe!
Just got introduduced to your blog yesterday,Thai turkey meatlof is in the oven now, love you already!! THANK YOU!!
This looks amazingly delicious!!!
Instead of using turkey, can i use pork? Is there anything that would have to change in the recipe?
Instead of making, a glaze, I am thinking of just dipping it into soy sauce! I hope this would work too.
P.S I am in Poland and i absolutely love your site!
Yes, you can definitely use pork instead of turkey. These flavors work really well with pork. You can also try shaping them into meatballs instead of a loaf to make them easier for dipping, although you’ll need to reduce the cooking time.
Great made it last night think I added a little to much srircha!!!