Step by Step Guide Making Ground Beef
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Prepare for a more flavorful addition to your recipes? Acquire how to cook footing beefiness the right style with our footstep-by-step guide.
Many recipes begin past telling readers to "chocolate-brown the basis beefiness," but don't explicate how. Is information technology easy? Yes—just there are still means it can go wrong. Here's how to cook ground beefiness the right fashion, and then it's tender, total of flavor and ready to use in your favorite ground beef recipes.
Use this method whether you need to know how to cook ground beefiness for tacos, how to cook ground beefiness for spaghetti, or whatever other dish yous're craving for dinner.
How to Melt and Brownish Ground Beef
This recipe is for one pound of ground beefiness and is ready in 8 to 10 minutes. For larger amounts of meat, employ a big skillet or dark-brown the meat in batches.
Ingredients
- 1 pound ground beef
- Salt and pepper, to season the beef in one case cooked
Editor's Tip: If using very lean ground beef or a stainless steel skillet prone to sticking, add a tablespoon or two of vegetable oil to the pan before adding the beef.
Tools You'll Need
- A stainless steel, bandage iron or nonstick skillet is a must. Look for a skillful-quality pan that distributes rut evenly.
- A sturdy wooden spoon or spatula like this i is perfect for breaking up the basis meat during cooking.
- This gadget helps to easily drain grease from the pan. A colander will also practice the trick.
Directions
Step 1: Oestrus your skillet
Set a medium- to large-sized skillet on a burner set to medium-high heat. Permit the pan to get hot.
Step 2: Break up and add the beef
Tear the ground beef into chunks and add to the hot pan in a unmarried layer.
Step 3: Allow the beef to cook
Allow the beefiness cook without moving it for the offset 5 minutes. The beef volition begin to dark-brown and develop color along the lesser.
Step 4: Pause up and move beef around
Use a wooden spoon to break upwardly the larger chunks of beef and gently move the beefiness around. You lot don't desire to overwork the meat; only move it enough to dark-brown it evenly. If the bottom is getting also dark, turn the heat down to medium.
Step 5: Drain the grease
Cook the beefiness a few minutes more until it's browned and no pink color remains. Utilise a draining utensil, a strainer or even a small plate to pour off nigh of the grease into a rut-proof container. (Never pour grease down the drain!) Keep a small corporeality of fat in with the beefiness; this will assist the meat stay moist and flavorful.
Apply your browned meat correct away in ane of these creative basis beef recipes or, if saving information technology for later, allow it to cool. And so spoon it into a sealed container and store in the refrigerator for upward to 5 days. (Learn how to tell if basis beefiness is bad.) To freeze it, put the cooked-and-cooled beef in a freezer-safety null-close bag and printing out all the air. Continue it frozen for up to three months.
Tips for Cooking with Ground Beefiness
Defrost Frozen Ground Beef Starting time
Ideally, for meat that is evenly cooked and moist, yous want to brown basis beefiness that is completely thawed. Here's how to defrost ground beef:
- Refrigerator method: 24 hours before cooking, remove the ground beefiness package from the freezer, put information technology in a basin or zilch-top bag, and place it in the fridge. Your beef should be completely defrosted by the time you're prepare to cook.
- Water method: If y'all only have an hr or two, place your frozen ground beef bundle into a nil-height bag, pushing out every bit much of the air as possible. Then, place the pocketbook into a bowl full of cold water and let the meat defrost for an hour. You should change the water around the 30-minute mark to keep information technology cold.
- Microwave method: Transfer the frozen footing beefiness to a microwave-safe plate and identify it in the microwave. Set your microwave to the defrost setting and microwave the beefiness in 20-30 second internals, flipping the beef each fourth dimension. It should have nigh 5 minutes or so for the meat to defrost. Note: The edges of the beef might start to cook every bit they get-go to defrost. This is fine as long every bit you fully cook the ground beef right after.
Melt the Meat Evenly
Don't driblet that brick of ground beef straight into the pan! To cook the meat evenly and prevent steaming, interruption upward the meat before information technology goes into the pan. Tear the meat into chunks by hand or with a wooden spoon and add these to the hot skillet in a single layer.
Apply a Hot Pan
The most common mistake people make when browning footing beef is putting the beef in a common cold pan. As it heats upwardly, the meat begins to steam, which makes it look deadening or grayness. The goal is to brown—as in sear—the meat, and to do this the pan needs to exist hot. So brand sure your skillet is hot before you add the ground beef!
Avoid Constant Stirring
After y'all add together the footing beef to the hot pan, allow it cook untouched for several minutes. Many cooks brand the mistake of constantly stirring ground beef as it browns, but this agitation drives moisture out of the meat, creating a tougher texture. Only later on the beef has a good sear on the bottom and yous run across the color creeping upward the sides should you begin to gently motion the footing beefiness in the pan.
Keep Some of the Grease in the Pan
Draining the grease from cooked basis beef makes your finished dish less greasy. However, for moist and flavorful meat, continue a tablespoon or ii of that fat in. Stir information technology through your browned beef. You'll however exist removing most of the fat while stillprotecting the meat from drying out.
Drain the remainder of the grease into a heat-proof container. Once information technology solidifies, scrape it into your trash. (Some municipal compost programs may accept grease, but don't put information technology in your backyard compost.)
Season the Footing Beef
When information technology comes to seasoning your ground beef, wait until afterwards it has been browned and drained. Adding salt to raw ground beef pulls out moisture, drying the meat out and creating steam while it cooks, which prevents it from browning properly. The aforementioned goes for other seasonings, merely for a different reason. Much of the herbs and spices will drain abroad forth with the grease, leaving your footing beefiness underseasoned.
Once your basis beef has been cooked and tuckered, information technology can be seasoned with almost anything. Salt and pepper are the basics and could be paired with a taco seasoning blend, Old Bay, herbes de Provence or garam masala, to name a few options. It just depends what you lot're planning on making with the beef. For inspiration, check out our favorite ground beef recipes of the by year.
Don't Rinse Beef!
One TikTok user nearly broke the net when she shared a video of cooked ground beef poured into a strainer and rinsed nether the faucet, which done all of the grease off the meat and correct downwardly the drain. (The video has since been deleted, merely you can grab information technology in @simplyfoodbyty'due south duet with the original post.) The user claimed information technology was a technique learned in a nutrition class, but y'all definitely should not rinse browned basis beef.
For one, grease and fats should never be poured down the sink drain. (Information technology'south one of the things plumbers want y'all to know.) The grease tin solidify in the pipes, creating clogs and a huge mess in sewers and septic systems. Additionally, while pouring off excess fat from browned beef makes it healthier, removing every last drop of fatty by rinsing it away will leave the beefiness tough, dry and tasteless.
If you're concerned about the amount of fat in ground beef, opt for the leanest option like basis sirloin. Or, apply footing turkey or ground chicken in place of beef, which are reasonably priced and have less fat.
How to Melt Frozen Ground Beef
While defrosted basis beefiness volition have the all-time flavor and texture, y'all can melt footing beef from frozen. Here's how:
- Heat your skillet as directed above.
- Add the frozen footing beefiness, repeatedly turning the brick of meat in the hot skillet and peeling away the outer layers as they brown through.
- Continue until all of the beef is cooked.
Browning your ground beefiness this way should really be a final resort; it's more than time-consuming and all that handling volition event in beef that's tough and unevenly cooked. Those in a time pinch will beloved these quick and easy ground beef recipes instead.
At present that you know how to cook and brown ground beef, you're gear up to make our all-time footing beefiness recipes.
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If you're a sloppy joe fan, try out this loose-meat sandwich recipe.
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Cheeseburger Macaroni Skillet
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Source: https://www.tasteofhome.com/article/how-to-brown-ground-beef/