This keto turkey meatloaf solves the two things wrong with most turkey loaves, dry and bland, in one move: it is rolled around a pesto spiral and wrapped in bacon. Baked on a rack so the bacon crisps, it slices into a pinwheel at about 2 grams of net carbs.
I don't know if this dish could possibly have a longer name, but I just felt there was no easy way to simplify it. This dish takes some effort to prep, but as soon as it is in the oven the work is done. Ground turkey is great to cook with and unlike ground beef it won't let off much fat. The only draw back in making a meatloaf with turkey is that it tends to taste a little dry unless doctored up, so I figured the best way to improve this problem would be to wrap the loaf in bacon. Yep that's right bacon! I tried this once before with a ground beef based loaf and it was a greasy mess, but with the turkey it works beautifully. Another trick to avoid the grease and end up with a crispy bacon crust is to form the loaf shape and then cook it in a small roasting pan with a rack. This allows the grease to drain off. This pesto spiral adds a ton of yummy flavor to this dish as well and the presentation is amazing.
The dry-turkey fix: pesto inside, bacon outside
Lean ground turkey makes a dry, bland meatloaf if you do nothing to it, and this recipe attacks that from both directions. The pesto spiraled through the center melts into the meat as it bakes, adding fat and herby flavor from the inside. The bacon wrap bastes the loaf in fat from the outside while it cooks, then crisps into a salty crust. The rack underneath is what makes the bacon work: it drains the grease so the strips crisp instead of stewing, which is exactly the greasy mess the author hit with a beef version. The last rule is not to overbake it, since even a moist turkey loaf dries out if you push it past temperature.
A meatloaf roulade
What turns this from a flat loaf into something is the roll. Rolling ground meat around a filling is a roulade, the same technique behind an Italian braciole, and spiraling pesto through the turkey gives you a pinwheel in every slice instead of a brown brick. There is no breadcrumb here either; parmesan and an egg bind the meat, so the only carbs are the pesto and cheese. One safety note, and a correction to the original: ground turkey needs to reach 165 degrees F, the USDA mark for poultry, not the 160 the old recipe listed. A homemade pesto makes the spiral, and for another turkey-and-cheese main see my keto stuffed meatballs. This loaf is one of the oven mains in my low carb comfort food dinners guide.
Sources
USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service, safe minimum temperature for ground poultry.
Sugarfreechic test kitchen, low-carb meatloaf notes.
