This Retro Take On Beef Wellington Can Save You Some Serious Dough

Beef Wellington is buttoned up, refined, and oh so fancy. It's a dish that might occupy your Champagne wishes and caviar dream. The dish consists of beef tenderloin that is often wrapped in paté, mushroom puree, and/or prosciutto. These delicious items are then enveloped in puff pastry and baked until the exterior is a golden brown. It is the perfect mix of savory meat and buttery, flaky pastry, sure to please even the poshest diner. Yes, beef Wellington is fancy, but that doesn't mean it can't let loose. Why not bring the rarified Wellington to more homegrown, retro territory? Rather than using a beef tenderloin, which can run you well over $100, make a meatloaf to serve as your filling.  

Okay, so adding meatloaf to a beef Wellington might seem sacrilegious. After all, meatloaf is, in many ways, the antithesis to Beef Wellington. With roots in the improvisational, stretch-a-penny world of Great Depression era cooking, meatloaf is a nostalgic and budget friendly dinner option. However, these two disparate dishes might just make for a match made in heaven. All you need do is make your meatloaf according to your preferred recipe, shape it into a tube, then wrap in puff pastry (yes, even Ina Garten thinks store-bought is fine), coat in egg wash, and bake until the interior is fully cooked (160 degrees Fahrenheit for beef and pork). You can serve it alongside mashed potatoes, on its own, accompanied by a gravy, or even, if you're feeling rebellious, a healthy squirt of ketchup.

This hack is perfect in its simplicity. At its most basic level, a meatloaf Wellington is simply a meatloaf wrapped in puff pastry. And of course you can stop there. However, you might want to give this unlikely mash up a few perks to, help meld these two dishes into one delicious meal. For starters, if you want something that is more accurate to a traditional beef Wellington, add a layer of chopped, sautéed mushrooms around your meatloaf (and under the puff pastry). This will give the dish a bit more depth and an umami edge that will add a punch of sophistication. If you don't care to add in a separate layer, you can also mix mushrooms directly into your meatloaf base. This will give the same flavor impact without the extra work of layering ingredients. 

You can also wrap your meatloaf in prosciutto, as is done with some beef Wellington recipes. This will give the dish a salty, complex kick that will further enhance the dish. Other tasty additions include caramelized onions (cooked to perfection in a cast iron pan), which can be mixed into your loaf or layered on top. Caramelized onions will add sweetness and warmth that can further enhance and elevate this dish. Serve with a gravy or a delicious cognac cream sauce for touch of sophistication to top off this culinary mashup.