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This Stove Top Stuffing Meatloaf is savory, moist, and easy, with stuffing mix doing the seasoning and binding work. No chopping onions, no hunting for Worcestershire sauce, and no soaking bread in milk. Just a box of stuffing, beef, eggs, ketchup, and water—you’re going to love how simple it is.
What I do know is that this meatloaf comes out moist, sturdy enough to slice, and savory in that familiar, comforting way that makes dinner feel like somebody tried. Not tried too hard, mind you. We’re not making a culinary statement here. We are getting supper on the table, and there is absolutely no shame in that game.
Why You’ll Love It
- Short ingredient list — stuffing mix adds flavor and helps hold the loaf together, so you don’t need breadcrumbs plus a cabinet full of spices.
- Tender and moist — the stuffing mix helps keep the beef from drying out.
- Budget-friendly — two pounds of lean ground beef stretches into six hearty servings.
- Dependable dinner — this is an easy, reliable meatloaf without a long list of steps.
Ingredient Notes
For the stuffing, any flavor of Stove Top works. I usually reach for the Chicken flavor because it’s what I keep around, though the savory herb version is nice too. Just use the standard 6-ounce box. Don’t prepare it first—this is important. The dry mix goes straight into the bowl with everything else. Easy does it.
I use lean ground beef, generally around 85% lean. You want enough fat to keep the loaf juicy, but not so much that it turns into a greasy little situation in the baking dish. Been there. The paper towels afterward were not festive.
Regular old ketchup is perfect here. Use what you have. Half goes into the meat mixture and half gets brushed over the top. It adds sweetness, tang, and moisture without turning the whole thing into ketchup loaf—which, no thank you.
The eggs bind it all together, and the water helps soften the stuffing mix as the loaf bakes. It looks a little odd when you first combine it, I’ll admit. Trust the process. Or don’t trust it exactly, but proceed anyway.
Ingredients
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 (6-ounce) box Stove Top stuffing mix, any flavor you like—I usually use chicken
- 2 pounds lean ground beef, 85% lean is a good middle-of-the-road choice
- 1/2 cup ketchup, divided into 1/4 cup for the loaf and 1/4 cup for the top
Instructions
Preheat your Oven to 350°F. Spray a 9-by-13-inch baking dish or pan with nonstick cooking spray and set it aside. I have forgotten this step before and then spent too much of my evening scraping baked-on meatloaf from the pan with a spatula.
Crack the eggs into a large bowl and add the water. Whisk them together until they’re well combined. Nothing fancy—just get the yolks broken up and blended in. A fork works perfectly fine if all the whisks are in the dishwasher. Kitchen rules are mostly suggestions, within reason.
Add the dry stuffing mix, ground beef, and 1/4 cup ketchup to the egg mixture. Wash your hands, roll up your sleeves if you’re wearing something worth saving, and mix everything together with your hands until it is combined.
Don’t overwork it. This is the one part where I have to restrain myself, because it can feel like you ought to keep kneading until everything is absolutely uniform. You do not. Mix just until there aren’t big pockets of dry stuffing or streaks of egg. Overmixed meatloaf gets tough, and nobody needs that kind of heartbreak at dinner.
Transfer the mixture to your prepared 9-by-13-inch dish. Shape it into a loaf right in the pan—sort of an oval-ish rectangle, about as neat as you feel like making it. I prefer baking it free-form in the larger dish rather than packing it into a loaf pan. The edges get a little more browned that way, and I am a sucker for those edges.
Brush the remaining 1/4 cup ketchup evenly over the top. You can use a spoon if you don’t have a pastry brush. I used the back of a spoon for years because pastry brushes seemed unnecessary for weeknights. Turns out I owned one the whole time, shoved in a drawer beside the corn holders.
Bake for 55 minutes at 350°F. The kitchen will start smelling like stuffing and roast beef.
Let the meatloaf cool for 10 minutes before slicing. But if you cut it immediately, it can crumble and slide around. Give it those ten minutes to settle itself.
Serve it warm with whatever makes sense in your house—mashed potatoes, a baked potato, sautéed green beans, glazed carrots, corn, salad, buttered bread.
Variations
The plain version is honestly my favorite, despite usually being the person saying, “Maybe it needs just a little more garlic.” But this meatloaf doesn’t need much help.
If you want a different glaze, barbecue sauce works in place of the ketchup. For a sweeter top, stir a couple tablespoons of Brown Sugar into the 1/4 cup ketchup before spreading it over the loaf. It gets sticky around the edges in the nicest way.
You can also replace part of the beef with ground Pork, turkey, or chicken. Half beef and half pork is especially good if you have it. I have added chopped onion and bell pepper before, and it was fine—good, even—but then it stopped being the easy four-ingredient dinner I was craving. Sometimes a shortcut should be allowed to remain a shortcut.
I tried adding mushrooms once because I had a carton in the fridge that was about to become questionable. They made the loaf wetter than I wanted, though maybe I chopped them too big. I’m not blaming the mushrooms entirely. They have suffered enough.
Storage & Reheating
Leftover meatloaf keeps well in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. I usually slice it before storing because it makes lunch easier later.
To reheat a slice, microwave it for 1 to 2 minutes, until warmed through. If it looks a little dry, add a tiny squirt of ketchup before reheating. Not elegant, but effective.
You can freeze the meatloaf, too. Wrap it tightly and freeze it uncooked for up to 4 months, or cooked for up to 3 months. Individual cooked slices are handy for quick lunches. Defrost them overnight in the refrigerator before reheating or baking.
Final Notes
There is something almost old-fashioned about meatloaf, isn’t there? Not fancy-old-fashioned, more like the kind of dinner that says the oven was turned on.
Then I slice it, put ketchup on my own plate even though the loaf already has ketchup on it (yes, I realize that is excessive), and remember that easy dinners count too.
Especially those.
Stove Top Stuffing Meatloaf
Ingredients
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 6-ounce box Stove Top stuffing mix any flavor you like, such as chicken; use dry and do not prepare first
- 2 pounds lean ground beef 85% lean is a good middle-of-the-road choice
- 1/2 cup ketchup divided into 1/4 cup for the loaf and 1/4 cup for the top
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350°F, then spray a 9-by-13-inch baking dish or pan with nonstick cooking spray and set it aside.
- Crack the eggs into a large bowl, add the water, and whisk until the yolks are broken up and the mixture is well combined.
- Add the dry stuffing mix, ground beef, and 1/4 cup ketchup to the egg mixture.
- Mix everything together with your hands just until combined, making sure there are no big pockets of dry stuffing or streaks of egg, but do not overwork the mixture.
- Transfer the mixture to the prepared 9-by-13-inch dish and shape it into a free-form loaf, like an oval-ish rectangle, directly in the pan.
- Brush or spoon the remaining 1/4 cup ketchup evenly over the top of the meatloaf.
- Bake the meatloaf at 350°F for 55 minutes.
- Let the meatloaf cool for 10 minutes before slicing so it can settle and hold together.