10 Ways to Cook Ground Beef – No Recipe Required

It’s been a while since I’ve added a post to this series.  In the past, we’ve covered:

Sometimes, you just don’t feel like dragging out a cookbook or even looking something up on the computer.  For those days, try one of these easy ideas.

I love to have ground beef browned out and stored in the freezer.  It makes it really easy to pull together a meal.  If you’d like to cook it in bulk, try using your crockpot to cook ground beef.

1. Hamburgers

There are a million ways to top a burger.  And you can choose to cook them on the outdoor grill, a George Foreman type grill or in a skillet.  Easy and classic.

2.  Tacos

Season the cooked ground beef with your favorite homemade or store-bought seasoning.  Stuff in your favorite shells.  Top with your favorite toppings.  Chances are, this meal is a staple in your house.

3.  Add to Spaghetti Sauce

This is a quick way to beef up your favorite spaghetti sauce.

4.  Meatloaf

Another classic with a million ways to fix it.  Try this method:

  • 1 egg per pound of meat
  • 1/2 cup tomato product (ketchup, BBQ sauce, chili sauce etc) per pound
  • 1/2 cup bread crumbs per pound
  • onions (and peppers and/or celery if you want), diced
  • salt and pepper

5.  BBQ Sandwiches

Stir your favorite barbecue sauce into a pound of cooked ground beef.  Serve it on buns.

6.  Quesadillas

Add cheese, tomatoes, salsa etc.  Fill soft tortillas and toast in a skillet.

7.  Gravy Topped Potatoes

Add a jar of beef gravy to one pound of browned hamburger.  Top baked potatoes for a hearty meal.

8.  Cheeseburger Baked Potatoes

Add your favorite grated cheese or Velveeta to a pound of cooked hamburger.  Top baked potatoes.  Add diced tomatoes and bacon bits too.

9.  Top a Pizza

I usually think of pepperoni or sausage for topping pizza, but ground beef is tasty too.

10.  Poor Man’s Steak

Add 1/2 cup bread or cracker crumbs, salt and pepper to a pound of raw hamburger.  Pat into patties and fry in skillet.  Pour 1 can cream of mushroom soup mixed with 1/3 can of water over the patties.  Heat and serve.

What’s your favorite way to use ground beef?

Tex Mex Shepherd’s Pie – Quick Weeknight Dinner

If you’ve got ground beef already cooked and frozen (one of my favorite quick-cooking tricks), this meal is a cinch to put together.

Hamburger, black beans and chili-ready diced tomatoes form the base layer.  All of that gets topped with Monterey Jack Cheese.  And covering it all is a generous helping of mashed potatoes.

I used plain instant potatoes, but one of the cheesy or garlic varieties would be tasty too.

Here’s what you’ll need:   [Read more...]

Cheesy Hamburger Soup

We love soup in our house.  This is a hearty soup, perfect for winter.

The recipe comes from an Amish Cookbook I have called Amish Friends Cookbook by Wanda Brunstetter.  The original name for the soup was Cheeseburger Soup, but there’s something a little unappealing about that to me.  So, I changed the name.

If you’ve got someone in your family who likes meat with a meal, this is a good soup to make for them.  It’s full of ground beef and potatoes.

Here’s what you’ll need:   [Read more...]

Hamburger Pasta Soup

I created this soup the other day when I needed something fast for dinner.  If you’ve got cooked hamburger in the freezer, this meal really comes together quick.  It’s a combination of Hamburger Vegetable Soup and Pasta Soup.

Feel free to vary the recipe according to what you like and what you have available in your pantry.  It’s a good one for using up small amounts of pasta.  You could also use rice or barley instead of the pasta.  And you might want to add more veggies.

Here’s what I used:  [Read more...]

Hamburger Stroganoff

This is a guest post from Ashley at AP Freewriting 101. If you are interested in guest posting on Eat at Home, contact me with your ideas.

I have a LOT on my plate during any given day:

  • Taking care of my kids: 23mo boy and 3.5yo girl
  • Working on my school work as I attempt to complete a two-year Masters degree program in one-year
  • Homeschooling my advanced preschooler
  • Blogging encouragement to women
  • Attempting to keep my house clean and my husband fed

By the time dinner rolls around, I’m pretty beat. I don’t want to spend much time in the kitchen at the end of a tiring day, and yet I don’t want to pay a hefty price for carry-out food. My solution? Quick, easy, and inexpensive pantry meals. [Read more...]

Cooking Meat to Freeze for Later

I know that picture has nothing to do with meat or cooking, but it does show what freezing looks like :-)   That was our Mickey head antenna topper last year during the ice storm.

The forecast is for snow here.  I’m writing this post a few days early, so by the time you read this we could have several inches of snow.  My kids have their fingers crossed!

Now, onto cooking.  One of the questions I get asked often is how I cook meat for freezing.  I use a lot of chicken and I like to cook it up and keep it in the freezer for casseroles and soups.  It really speeds things up when I pull fully cooked chicken from the freezer. [Read more...]

Baked Spaghetti

baked-spaghetti-done-whole

We had friends over a few weeks ago.  It was very spontaneous and we went back and forth trying to decide whose house we would get together at.  Turns out both my friend and I were thinking of making a spaghetti dish, because that’s what we had ingredients for.  I’ll have to eat her version sometime.  Here’s mine (actually a recipe my mom has made for years).

[Read more...]

50s Prime Time Meatloaf

fifties-prime-time-meatloaf-done

The other day while I was thinking about Disney World, I started looking through recipes on AllEars.Net.  Deb has an excellent collection of recipes for foods that are served in various WDW restaurants.  I made note of several that I want to try, including this meatloaf which is served at the 50s Prime Time Cafe in Disney’s Hollywood Studios.  The meatloaf was easy to make, flavorful and moist.  As a bonus, it made so much I turned it into two loaves and froze one for another time.

[Read more...]

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