meatloaf

American  

[meet-lohf] / ˈmitˌloʊf /

Or meat loaf

noun

• meatloaves
  plural

1. a dish of ground meat, often mixed with other ingredients, as breadcrumbs and seasonings, molded in the shape of a loaf and baked.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• meatloaves
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of meatloaf

First recorded in 1890–95; meat + loaf ¹

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Explanation

When you mix ground beef with spices and bake it in a bread pan, you get a meatloaf. Cut into slices and put between two pieces of bread, meatloaf makes a great sandwich, too. Meatloaf is a staple of many dinner tables, often served with mashed potatoes and a green vegetable. Variations on meatloaf have been around at least since 5th-century Rome, and it's especially common today in Germany and parts of Scandinavia. You can think of a meatloaf as a giant meatball, a mixture of ingredients like ground meat, breadcrumbs, herbs, and often vegetables or cheese. This dish shouldn't be confused with the singer known as Meat Loaf.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

meatloaf meatloaves

Elsewhere in Italy that means meatloaf; in cost-conscious Genoa, it means a combination of boiled green beans and potatoes, ground down and combined with cheese, eggs and fresh herbs, and then baked.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 23, 2026

“Everyone has their mom’s meatloaf or grandma’s roast chicken, but how can we make this fit all of the boxes for GLP-1s?” she said.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2026

When Julie Masino became Cracker Barrel’s CEO in 2023, she arrived with plans to modernize a restaurant chain known for breakfast, meatloaf, rocking chairs and a homespun atmosphere.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026

Steakhouse meatloaf works because it leans into the savory: deeply seasoned, unapologetically umami, held together with intention.

From Salon ● Mar. 11, 2026

My grandma never noticed until she went to clean the booster seat one day and ran into all this old food underneath it—mashed potatoes and meatloaf and chicken nuggets and carrots, all this gross stuff.

From "Courage to Soar" by Simone Biles

In meatballs and meatloaves, for crisply coating cutlets and fried fish and mozzarella sticks: breadcrumbs, yes.

From Seattle Times ● Mar. 7, 2024

She trots out mom-speak chestnuts — “you’ll shoot your eye out” — and churns out meatloaves for the family dinners.

From Washington Post ● Feb. 4, 2023

I will assume that you have already passed the sophomore class of ground meat with its burgers, meatloaves, meatballs, and their consortiums.

From Slate ● Sep. 13, 2018

“When you start researching meatloaf varieties, you realize how many people have done meatloaves that essentially mimic other dishes,” Mr. Bruni said.

From New York Times ● Feb. 6, 2017

Kibbeh can be fried or roasted or stewed, layered into sloppy casseroles or baked into big meatloaves.

From The Guardian ● Dec. 7, 2016

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