langoustine bbq meatloaf

A few years ago, I first learned of langoustines on MasterChef when there was a Pressure Test involving cooking a langoustine dish. I remember Gordon Ramsay saying langoustines are a luxury ingredient because when they are fresh, they are only good for 24 hours if you want to cook them whole after the langoustines die.

Looking back on that memory, I thought to myself that I would never get to make a meatloaf with langoustines in it due to their rarity and expense- until I went to Trader Joe's a few weeks ago and found frozen langoustine tails for sale! When I go to a supermarket and I find a rare ingredient I would like to use in one of my recipes for this channel, I rarely pass the opportunity to purchase said ingredient. 12 ounces of langoustine tails is $11.99 where I'm from, so it's not like it's as expensive as good caviar.

After doing some research on the langoustine, I found out that it is a cross between a crayfish(not a crawfish) and a lobster, but the tails are the size of one whole shrimp usually. Only the tails and claws of langoustines are edible. It turns out people use langoustines at barbecues(like Jamie Oliver) and I had some BBQ sauce on hand, so I decided to make a BBQ meatloaf with langoustines.

The tails I bought were safe to eat raw, so I hypothesized correctly that langoustines wouldn't take long to cook in an oven, hence the usage of unsweetened applesauce in lieu of eggs for this recipe.

Normally when I mix up the ingredients in a meatloaf recipe, I use my(washed) hands, but for some reason my dad insisted it would be gross to use your hands to mix up a meatloaf mixture with BBQ sauce(I don't know the reasoning behind his logic), so at his request I used a spoon to mix up the ingredients.

After eating a few bites of the meatloaf, I realized it was missing something and I thought of all the good times I had at Red Lobster eating lobster with butter. So I put butter on top of this meatloaf and it tasted even more delicious! The butter really makes the meatloaf extra decadent.

You will need:

For the cooking equipment:

A lasagna pan
Nonstick cooking spray

For the meatloaf:

2/3 tbsp. of onion powder
2/3 cups of unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup of your favorite BBQ sauce
Pinch of paprika
Pinch of garlic powder
Pinch of black pepper
Pinch of salt
1 cup of breadcrumbs
12 ounces of langoustine tails

Butter to top the meatloaf(optional)

1. Put all meatloaf ingredients in a large bowl.
2. Mix up all the ingredients using a spoon so that all the ingredients are distributed evenly among the mixture.
3. Spray a lasagna pan with nonstick cooking spray.
4. Form 2 loaves.
5. Bake in a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven for 10-15 minutes.
6. Top with butter(optional). Bon appetit!