Curried Ground Beef with Green Peppers

If I’m being perfectly honest here—I work a lot. I juggle a full-time and part-time job, which zaps about 60 hours of my week. I also strive to reach that perfect balance of "me time" and time spent with my love, friends, and family. On any given weekday, you can find me going to job number 1, coming home and eating dinner, and then hustling off to job number 2. In order to survive with this schedule on Whole30, I have to be a champion meal prepper. This includes buying and making a lot of quick-cooking meats—more specifically, ground meats. I also try to make things from ground meats that I can fashion into different meals to prevent boredom throughout the week. This particular recipe was conceived as I stared at a package of ground beef and thought to myself, “What can I make besides more hamburgers?” and I present it to you in two different ways. Let me know what you think!

                                   Curried Ground Beef with Green Peppers

1 tablespoon coconut oil

1/2 medium onion, diced

1 green pepper, diced

3 cloves garlic, finely diced

1 pound ground beef

1 tablespoon yellow curry

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

salt and pepper, to taste

1/4 cup canned coconut milk**

1.) Heat a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add coconut oil and swirl to coat the pan.

2.) Add onions and peppers, and stir. Continue cooking about 4-5 minutes, or until soft.

3.) Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30-45 seconds.

4.) Add ground beef, and break up with a spatula. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until no pink remains, about 5-6 minutes.

5.) Notch down the heat to medium low. Add the curry, coriander, crushed red pepper, and salt and pepper, and stir to combine.

6.) Add the coconut milk, and stir. Let simmer and meld together about 2-3 minutes.

**If you’re looking for more of a sauce with the meat, then add more coconut milk one tablespoon at a time until you reach the desired consistency. 1/4 cup works for me because I like to use the ground beef for salads throughout the week, so I don't want it too "sauce-like." However, if zoodles are your goal, add more coconut milk!

Recommendations

The salad pictured above has romaine lettuce, spinach, cauliflower rice, and cherry tomatoes and is topped with the ground beef mixture. I usually drizzle a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar over the salad for a little extra punch.

I also love having the ground beef with a serving of potatoes (see: last entry, re: meat and potatoes girl). In the picture below, I roasted red, white, and blue potatoes with olive oil, salt and pepper, and rosemary in a 400^o oven for about 30 minutes. The ground beef is also great over a bed of cauliflower rice mixed with sautéed spinach. 

Breakfast Sausage Patties with Potatoes and Spinach

Being the product of a tried and true Midwest/Southern family, meat and potatoes course through my veins. Growing up, besides my sister’s frequent requests of spaghetti (and at that age, “spaghetti” meant buttered noodles with the sauce in a bowl on the side), it’s difficult to recall a meal without these two essential ingredients. From this, my deep love for savory breakfast flourished (yes, we’ll go with “flourished”) into a full-on obsession. Pancakes or donuts for breakfast? I’ll pass. If I want to feel full and satisfied, I need a down-home, meat-and-potatoes breakfast—modified for Whole30, of course. So, this recipe is my first attempt to squash the 10-year-old girl inside of me that wants biscuits and gravy for every meal.

                           Breakfast Sausage Patties with Potatoes and Spinach

Breakfast Sausage

1 egg

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 1/2 teaspoons fennel seeds, chopped

1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

1 teaspoon red pepper flakes

2 teaspoons ground sage

2 teaspoons dried thyme

1 teaspoon black pepper

1 1/2 teaspoons salt, more or less to taste

1 – 1 1/4 pound ground pork or ground meatloaf mix

1 tablespoon coconut oil

Potatoes and Spinach

1 – 2 tablespoons reserved pork fat

2 medium white or sweet potatoes, diced

salt and pepper, to taste

2-3 handfuls of spinach

Coconut oil, if needed

1.) Add egg and spices to a medium bowl. Whisk together until fully incorporated. Add ground pork or meatloaf mix, and mix with your hands until egg and spice mixture is evenly dispersed throughout the meat, trying to work the meat as minimally as possible.

2.) Form meat into patties. I typically divide the meat into 5 equal balls, and then divide each ball into 2 patties—for a total of 10 patties. Your size and quantity can vary depending on your needs and preferences.

3.) Heat a large sauté pan over medium to medium-high heat. Add coconut oil, and swirl to coat the pan.

4.) Add 5 patties to the pan, and cook about 4-6 minutes on each side depending on their thickness. Adjust heat as needed. (Note: I typically drop the heat to slightly above medium after a couple of minutes to prevent the outside of the sausage from burning before the inside is fully cooked. This, of course, depends on the hotness of your stove. Your main goal is get nice browning on the outside and fully cooked on the inside.)

5.) Remove patties from pan and rest on a paper-towel lined plate. Cook remaining patties.

6.) After patties are cooked, set aside and remove pan from heat. Reserve 1 to 2 tablespoons of fat and wipe out with a paper towel.

7.) Return clean pan to medium to medium-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon of reserved fat and swirl to coat the pan.

8.) Add potatoes to pan. Season with salt and pepper, and mix. Cover potatoes and let cook 8-10 minutes or until tender when pierced with a fork, stirring occasionally. If the potatoes start sticking to the pan, turn heat down to medium and add additional tablespoon of the reserved fat.

9.) When potatoes done, add spinach. Mix spinach to wilt. Taste for seasoning, and adjust as needed. Remove from heat and serve with sausage patties.

Recommendations:

Beat 4-5 eggs in a bowl and add to potatoes, 2-3 minutes before potatoes are done. Cook eggs and potatoes undisturbed for 2-3 minutes. Add the spinach, and break up the egg and potato mixture with a spatula and continue to stir until the egg is fully cooked and spinach is wilted.

Sausage recipe adapted from: http://meatified.com/slow-cooker-breakfast-meatloaf/