Name: Sweet and Tangy Meatloaf Recipe
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 60 min
Total time: 75 min
Ingredients: 1 pound ground beef; 1 cup plain bread crumbs; 1 egg; ½ teaspoon garlic powder; 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce; ⅓ cup ketchup; ¼ cup brown sugar; ¼ cup apricot preserves; ¼ cup ketchup; ¼ cup brown sugar; ¼ cup apricot preserves

This post may contain affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy.

While there are plenty of meatloaf recipes out there, this sweet and tangy meatloaf recipe is one of our favorite family dinner recipes. It is such an easy meatloaf recipe, but you’d never know it from the taste.

This ground beef recipe uses plenty of great seasonings to make a great flavor profile for this easy family dinner. It is so simple and made with ingredients you can easily find if you don’t already have everything right in your pantry.

One thing I love about meatloaf is that it is a recipe I know my kids will eat and not complain about because it has the sweetness from the brown sugar and a little bit of tanginess from the apricots.

A bowl of raw ground beef surrounded by ketchup, apricot jam, seasonings, breadcrumbs, brown sugar, an egg, and a loaf pan on a marble surface.

A glass bowl with ground meat, brown sugar, breadcrumbs, and ketchup, with a spoon, on a marble countertop next to a striped towel.

Recipe Ingredient Notes

To make our sweet and tangy meatloaf, you need the following ingredients:

Ground beef
Plain bread crumbs
Egg
Garlic powder
Worcestershire sauce
Ketcup
Brown Sugar
Apricot preserves

Equipment Needed

For this recipe, you only need a few simple kitchen tools. We recommend using the following equipment:

Raw meatloaf mixture pressed into a rectangular metal loaf pan on a white marble countertop with a striped towel nearby.

A white bowl contains brown sugar, ketchup, and orange marmalade with a fork, placed on a marble countertop next to a striped towel.

How to Make Our Sweet and Tangy Meatloaf Recipe

Preheat oven to 350℉.
In a large bowl, combine ground beef, breadcrumbs, egg, garlic powder, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, brown sugar and apricot preserves.
Place in a greased 9×5 inch loaf pan.
Cook for 40-50 minutes.
In a separate bowl combine ketchup, brown sugar and apricot preserves. Remove meatloaf from oven after it has cooked, spread on glaze and cook for an additional 20 minutes.

Recipe Notes

If you have always wanted to make your own jam, apricot jam is a must! It has some of the best flavor, and is totally underrated compared to the other flavors of jam. Make your own using AllRecipes’ Apricot Jam recipe and use it in your meatloaf! Let us know how it goes, nothing compares to homemade jam.

A spoon spreading red jam over a baked oat crust in a rectangular metal pan on a white marble surface.

A glazed meatloaf sits on a white rectangular plate with one thick slice cut and slightly pulled away from the loaf.

Enjoy More Delicious Beef Main Dishes

The possibilities for delicious beef main dishes are endless, from cuts of meat like steak or roast, to family-friendly ground beef dishes, explore our comprehensive collection of beef recipes.

Join The Discussion

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Questions & Reviews

Janet Drury says:

I love belonging to your blog. My husband has Non-Hodgkins lymphoma and is under chemotherapy. We have to eat non-processed foods with lots of whole grains, greens, and NO SUGAR, as sugar feeds cancer. Could you possibly start a non-red meat (red meats block chemo going into the cells) recipe section for these? They have to be meals a third grader would eat, because hubby doesn’t like veggies, so my friends so far have been bringing soups with them in them. But, there is only so much soup he will eat.

Thank you.
Vanessa says:

It is also really easy to add shredded carrots into a meatloaf to sneak in veggies. This look delicious!
Happy Valley Chow says:

I love a good meatloaf and this definitely sounds like a winner!
Kate says:

Just throwing this out there, but I add ground pork to my meatloafs, keeps them nice and moist. Also, a lot of people use ground turkey instead of beef for meatloaf. And would substituting one of the non-sugar sweeteners work? Seems like most of them substitute with a small change in amount. Hope that helps you a little, good luck to you and your husband!
Chandra@The Plaid and Paisley Kitchen says:

Oh Ladies this is my perfect made in Heaven Comfort Meal!!!!
Teresa says:

I love the idea of apricot preserves in the sauce. This sounds wonderful.
Kira says:

I was going to say the same thing as Kate. I NEVER use ground beef. Almost any recipe you can substitute another ground meat. I prefer ground chicken and there is very few things where my family doesn’t like the substitution better! Good luck!
Kayleigh says:

I made this recipe last week and it was way too sweet. I even left out some of the brown sugar and the apricot preserves completely. Kids hated it, but husband and I ate it. If I made this again I wouldn’t use any brown sugar and still leave out the apricot preserves.

I added shredded zucchini to mine, to sneak in some vegetables. I would do that again, too!
Carolyn says:

Made this for dinner and my family liked it. Ended up cooking it on 375 degrees for the last 30 mins due to mine looking a little uncooked. Would use a little less glaze because I thought it was a little too sweet. Thanks for another great recipe!
Diana says:

Should I reduce cook time for cooking it in a muffin tin?
Cyd says:

You would need to reduce the cooking time for muffin tins. Just be sure they don’t burn, and that they are cooked through.
Kathryn says:

This meatloaf is amazing!!! Love the apricot flavor. Definitely recommend making it!
Diane says:

Tried this for a different twist on meatloaf and didn’t care for it-very disappointed. More sweet than tangy and (perhaps I used the wrong brand) very “dense/gummy/gluey” due the bread crumbs. Seemed the cooking time was to long. It was done after 40 minutes and to cook it another 20 after adding the topping-mine was starting to burn on the bottom. Not sure what happened, but the flavor of the beef was lost. Going back to my old standby recipe.
Tara says:

Liked the flavor of the sauce, was the texture of the meatloaf was very off-putting. Super mushy. I like the sweet and tangy option to mix things up,but the sweetness of the meatloaf too was just too much. Would probably just serve the sauce with a traditional recipe in the future.
Renae says:

I have a recipe similar to this, instead of the Apricots I used crushed pineapples and it turned out very good. I may have to try this with the Apricots.
Laurie says:

Not a fan of this one. Way too sweet. Nothing tangy about it. After reading the reviews, I tried to cut the sweetness by adding mustard to the glaze. Still too sweet. Love most of your recipes, but this one is just a hot mess.
Emily says:

I agree with some of these other comments. WAY too sweet. It was almost like a dessert instead of a savory entree. Each serving has about 25g of sugar in it, which is the same amount of sugar as a Snickers bar (the large one, not the bite-size/fun-size ones). If I made this another time, I’d put maybe 1 tablespoon sugar in the loaf, instead of 1/4 cup, and cut the sugar in the glaze down similarly.
Melanie Alward says:

I’d never made meatloaf before, but after my husband reminisced about the meatloaf his mum used to make I decided to give it a try. I trawled around looking for recipes, tried a couple, and then found this one! What a winner!!!
I use it all the time now, sometimes substituting the apricot preserve for mango chutney (a great British staple) and sometimes forgoing the glaze to wrap it in pastry.
Thank you!
Melanie
Janice Frank says:

I wasn’t really looking for a new meatloaf recipe, but those cheeky apricot preserves dared me to try this one. I don’t think my hubby will eat my old recipe anymore! It’s a good thing I love it, too! Thanks for teaching an old dog a new trick!
Carrie says:

I just wanted to leave you a note that I love your recipe. This was my first experience with making meatloaf. The apricot preserves really caught my eye. My whole family really loved it! I put more or less brown sugar depending on my sweet tooth is but definitely keeping this one 🙂
Michelle says:

We have made this several times and my family loves it! My kids are picky eaters and the sweetness is just enough to make the meat taste.
Easy and delicious recipe!
Michelle says:

I made a mistake. That should say mask the meat taste:)
Lyn McKernan says:

this is the first time I’ve seen any of your recipes so I decided I would join thanks
Randy Taylor says:

This is the fourth time that I made this for my wife and grandchildren we have fun in mixing the ingredients and more fun just eating it. Goes great with corn and mashed potatoes. One thing about it, We just put the plates in the dishwasher and go !
Tiffany S says:

Love this recipe, it’s the only one I use! We love the sweetness of it!
Denise Lemmel says:

Can I use quick cook oatmeal instead of bread crumbs? I want to make it for my father and I don’t have bread crumbs because I always used oatmeal.
John W says:

It was ok. not my idea of what meatloaf should be.
Kristen says:

Delicious! My husband who is skeptical of meatloaf had seconds! I cooked mine in a muffin tin (it filled up 10 spots) for 25 min and it was perfect!
Armed Gardener says:

I am not going to lie I have heard about apricot jam being used to make meatloaf and I was sceptical I’m not going to lie. But I tasted the glaze after I made it and I almost lost my $π!+ It was good the only suggestion I have is of you have a family of four double the amount because you will want seconds!!! This is an absolutely amazing recipe follow it to the end and you will love it.