What to do with 95/5 ground beef?

[Sony]

Hi all,

Grocery shopper for the week just picked up REALLY lean ground beef, and I'm not quite sure what to do with it. Usually I make burgers, meatballs or meatloaf with ground beef but I have a feeling that meat this lean won't work well in these applications.

What do you think? And if it is, what ideas do you have for me to use this?

Only stipulation I have is that I don't eat pork, so anything bacon-wrapped is out for me .....

[Carolyn Tillie]

Ah, the lack of a pork thing makes it more difficult. I would have normally suggested the addition of pork, sausage, or bacon. You could seriously get some beef suet to ground into it for flavor. How about some duck fat? Regrind it with more fat to get the flavor. While expensive, adding some veal would also help.

[srhcb]

95/5 ground beef would be perfect for Marlene's (Dad's) Peanut Butter Burgers!

Honest. Try it!

SB

[tino27]

You can also fry up some onion (softened, not caramelized) and add it to the meat before forming the meatball/burger/etc. I often do this with lean ground turkey and it keeps things nice and moist. Plus it adds flavor.

[scubadoo97]

You can use it in a meat sauce where you would typically drain off the fat anyway.

[Malawry]

It works ok in stuffed cabbage, in my experience. Also, sometimes I've added a little diced butter to super-lean beef before making burgers with it, and that's worked great.

[Octaveman]

I say make a nice sized patty out of it, season it up with salt/pepper and fry it up in a fry pan. Put a slice of butter on it to melt before it's done. Then sauted some mushrooms with garlic and top the patty. Yum.

[jsmeeker]

make taco meat out of it.

[snowangel]

Sloppy joes!

[petite tête de chou]

Loco Moco! I marinate the ground meat (usually ground turkey breast- talk about lean and flavorless) in a bit of teriyaki sauce because smothering it in brown gravy with an egg or two fried in butter topped with green onions and toasted sesame seeds *might* not add enough flavor.

[scott123]

I'm curious, are you trying to reduce your fat intake? Was the lean beef a really good buy? Did they run out of the 80/20 stuff?

There's some good workarounds here, but ultimately, I think your hunch that very lean won't work in burgers, meatballs and meatloaf is on the money.

[shellfishfiend]

I recently grilled hamburgers using ground venison. I would imagine that the fat content of the venison was similar to your ground beef. I placed a pat of butter and a slice of cheese in the middle of the burgers. They turned out extra moist. however, I did only cook them to medium rare.

[Sony]

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! More are definitely welcome, because I froze a lot of the meat in small batches.

I typically don't buy such lean ground meat....The person grocery shopping for me (because I've been sick, bless her ) picked it up. The pack is several lbs (and she didn't want to take any) so I think I'll be able to try out all of the great suggestions! And hopefully turn them into some yummy dishes to share with her.

Anyway, today I ended up doing a little experiment. I made a batch of meatballs (I was feeling the urge to meditatively roll raw meat in my hands ) I added a lot of blended raw onion (it looked like almost a cup of onion for a pound of meat) , tomato paste, chopped spinach and some milk-soaked bread. Seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic, Italian seasonings....They actually came out quite juicy and tender- different than how I usually make meatballs, but a relative success! They're now individually frozen and ready for quick, low-maintenance dinners.

One quick question- would smooth natural peanut butter work OK for the peanut butter burgers, or does it have to be the ultra-smooth homogenized kind?

Look forward trying out more suggestions. Thank you!

[OnigiriFB]

Larb! Add enough chili you wont even notice.

[Swisskaese]

You can also stuff an eggplant or butternut squash.

Cut the eggplant or butternut squash in half. Place in an oiled baking dish cut side down and roast at 220C/375F for about 25 to 30 minutes or until soft.

Meanwhile, mix 500g/1lb of meat with one small minced onion, 1/3 cup of raw rice, bulgar or couscous, tablespoon of dijon mustard, two tablespoons of pomegranate molasses and 1 tablespoon of cinnamon or ras al hanut and a generous tablespoon of toasted pinenuts. Mound the meat on top of the eggplant or squash halves. Pour 1 cup of crushed tomatoes over the meat and 1 cup of water. Cover the baking dish with foil and bake for approximately 45 minutes at 180C/350C.

Edited January 23, 2007 by Swisskaese (log)

[HKDave]

Adding a panade (aka panada) - that's milk-soaked bread - is an old-school, but effective, way to keep ground meat juicy without adding fat, and you're on the right track with what you did on the meatballs. Cook's Illustrated came to a similar conclusion on the best way to keep well-done burgers juicy, which is a variation on the same problem - in a well-done burger all the fat gets cooked out.

http://www.cooksillustrated.com/recipe.asp...=3883&bdc=46596

[deltadoc]

Make some Maid-Rites. The following is my recipe from eating them for 52 years and just recently hit upon the exact right combination:

3 lbs 95% Ground Beef

1 C diced yellow onion

3 TBSP L&P Worcestershire Sauce

3 TBSP Kikkoman Reg. Soy Sauce

2 TBSP Dark Brown Sugar

1/4 C Apple Cidar Vinegar

1 C Swanson Chicken Broth

6 oz. Coca-Cola (Regular)

1 tsp Paprika California Sweet (from Penzey's Spices)

1/2 tsp Salt

1/4 tsp Black Pepper

Put in crock pot on low overnight with vent open. Next day, use a slotted spoon to put on hamburger bun, serve with dill pickle slices, diced onion, yellow mustard, ketchup optional. The meat will be tender and moist, and it is ok to dump it all into a sieve and discard any remaining liquid. The idea during cooking is to keep the meat moist and slow cook it (if you don't have a crock pot).

doc