What to do with 75% lean ground beef

Taco salad's, meat loaf, manwhich, hamburgers, veggie beef soup.

I make a dish....cook ground beef & strain the fat, then you saute onions & garlic in a little olive oil, add sliced cabbage, i add caraway seeds, add chicken broth but not enough to cover(it's not soup) close lid & cook till cabbage is almost done, then add rice,(you can add a little more chicken broth at this point) put the lid on & cook till rice is done. If your not good with judging how much rice to put in, you can cook the rice separate & mix in. If you don't want to eat rice, leave it out but it's better with rice. when done, i like to put sour cream on top. You can look up recipies on line too. Personally I like to eat plain ground beef patties grilled with a baked potato & veggies

If you brown the hamburger and strain it, you can then remove additional fat by running it under hot water. This does remove some of the flavor, but the if you use the meat in things like light versions of chili, taco meat, etc., it really doesn't matter much.

Try adding beans or lentils to help make that meat stretch and lower the calories. Black beans to the taco meat, lentils for the meatloaf.

louann_jude wrote: »

Taco salad's, meat loaf, manwhich, hamburgers, veggie beef soup.

anything like this that you brown the meat first so you can discard the excess fat before moving on to whatever final product. or soup-like stuff that you can skim off the fat before serving. at 75%, you'll have some fat you can really get rid of and still have some taste.

some of the cuts that go into 75% also might use long, moist cooking (stew-style) to break down the connective tissue not already chopped up by the grounding process. thank goodness for alton brown explanations, LOL.

Shepherd's pie, hamburger steak, stuffed bell peppers....

mix with pinto beans and chile for a nice filling meal.

Try beef mousakka. Or make a nice curry by adding chickpeas and lots of spices and veggies... cauliflower or green beans go well with it.

Fake beef stroganoff is a hit at our house

Stuffed Pepper Soup (Cooking Light)

1/2 pound ground round
2 cups chopped green bell pepper
1 cup chopped onion
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 (14-ounce) can less-sodium beef broth
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 (10 3/4-ounce) can tomato soup, undiluted
1 1/2 cups hot cooked white rice

Heat a small Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add beef; cook 3 minutes or until browned, stirring to crumble. Add chopped green bell pepper and onion; cook 8 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Stir in black pepper, less-sodium beef broth, diced tomatoes, and tomato soup; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer 45 minutes.
Spoon 1/4 cup hot cooked white rice into each of 6 bowls; top with 1 cup soup.

*Variations: for tomato soup I use Amy's or Progresso - Campbell's too sweet (IMO). I also like to add some basil. You can use brown rice. Red & green pepper combo is nice.

Chili is always great and spaghetti to offset calories load both dishes with veggies and eat with no rice or pasta but use veggie options like cauliflower rice or zucchini noodles. Best dish I make with ground meat is Taco salad

Here's one of my favorite recipes, courtesy of my mom:

Sloppy Joe Sauce

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46 fl oz tomato juice
2 cups ketchup
1 green pepper, diced
1 onion, chopped
3 stalks celery, chopped (including leaves)
2 Tablespoons brown sugar
2 Tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 Tablespoon mustard

Add tomato sauce and ketchup to a pot, and put over medium heat. Chop vegetables (I use a food processor) and add to the sauce. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.

This makes a very large amount of sauce. I portion the recipe into fourths and freeze them. I thaw the sauce in the fridge the day before I make the sloppy joes (although in a pinch, just microwaving them to break up the ice a bit is fine).

When I want to make the sloppy joes, I brown one pound of ground beef, and when it's fully browned, add one of the sauce portions (that is, 1/4 of the original recipe) and heat until the sauce is simmering. I let the meat and sauce simmer for a few minutes. I prefer to serve by slicing open a fresh kaiser roll from a local deli and adding heaping portions of meat. You'll get four to eight sloppy joes per pound of beef, depending on just how much meat you like to pack on each one.

This makes a sloppy joe with a lot of sauce and flavor, and a good mixture of meat and veggies. You could really easily stretch the sauce over five or six pounds of meat instead of four if you want it to be meatier.