Grilled Meatloaf

We didn't have anything going on today, so I was trying to think of something good to grill for dinner. I thought about grilling pizza, but my wife said she would rather order pizza from Nancy's than go through all that work. Plus it is pretty messy. I then got the idea of grilling a meatloaf. Of course I would have to convince the kids first. Ella likes bacon, so I won her over by saying I would wrap it in bacon. Steph was pretty easy to convince too. Brayden was still on the fence though. I told him it would be like a BIG hamburger. That got him. :)  Here is the list of ingredients I used:

1.3 lbs ground chuck
1.3 lbs ground pork
1/2 a sweet onion chopped coarsely
1 red bell pepper chopped coarsely
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 egg
3/4 C bread crumbs
Worcestershire sauce
Kosher salt
Black pepper
My home made BBQ rub
18 slices of bacon

I normally throw in ingredients and don't really measure, so that is why some of the ingredients do not have measurements by them. With so much meat, I knew I had to split it up into two loaves otherwise it would take forever to cook. I fired up both the Genesis and the kettle. I set up both grills for indirect grilling since the meat loaves were going to take approximately an hour each to grill. While the grills were preheating, I mixed the first 10 ingredients together in a large bowl and set aside.

Now came the fun part, weaving the bacon. Weaving bacon is not as hard as it looks. I laid out 4 slices of bacon next to each other on top of parchment paper. I folded down the second and fourth slice. I then laid a slice across where the folded bacon was and then unfolded the second and fourth slices. Next I folded up the first and third slices and laid another slice across. I then unfolded the first and third slice. I continued until my bacon weave was done.

I then took approximately half of the meat mixture and laid it on top of the bacon weave. I formed the meat mixture into a loaf like form. I then folded the parchment paper around the meat mixture until the bacon stuck to the meat. I took all of this and laid it in a foil pan with the bacon ends on the bottom. I folded the ends under the loaf and formed it a little more.  They looked like little works of art.  LOL!

I took some of my home made BBQ rub and sprinkled it over the loaves.

By this time the grills were ready to go. I took a couple of small chunks of hickory smoke wood and threw it on top of the charcoal. I put the loaves on the grills foil pan and all. I checked the temperature about 30 minutes in to makes sure the were cooking at a good pace.

They were both about 120 degrees. After about another 30 minutes, I spread some BBQ sauce over the top of the loaves.

I checked them again in 15 minutes and they were both around 165 degrees which is where I wanted them. I pulled them off of the grill and let them sit for a few minutes.

 

I sliced them both with an electric knife and they were done perfectly.

 

I have always wanted to try grilled meatloaf and am glad I was able to do it today. I thought it was pretty tasty. The hickory gave the one loaf a really nice flavor. I didn't use quite enough of it though. Now I know for next time. If you haven't tried grilled meatloaf, I would highly recommend it. Thanks for looking!

Chuck