Don’t Make a Burger Blunder! Cook It All at Once

It’s midterm week and I signed up for four shifts of work this week…all in a row. Monday, I had 10 minutes between class and work. What resulted? Peanut butter and jelly toast and a glass of milk, an apple in tote as I hauled it to work; so my apologies for not keeping up with the blog. In all honesty, I haven’t been making anything of real merit anyway. Until today!

Tuesday, an unloved weekday for most, allows me the greater afternoon to prepare foodstuffs. I had about a half pound of ground beef in the fridge, and knowing that this week would be a scramble for finding time for food, I decided to cook all of it at once and then refrigerate it. When I need it I just throw it into a frying pan with a few teaspoons of water and vwahlah! Instant beef! Okay, so it’s not actually miracle grow ground beef, but as long as you use it within the week it should stay fresh enough to add to rice, pasta, couscous or potatoes.

So today, I wanted to see how it worked out with some couscous and boiled carrots. And it worked out quite well. With the added tart of lemon juice and saltiness of seasonings, it was one heap of tastytasty. It’s a pretty straight forward dish and you could easily add frozen peas, broccoli, chicken etc to this dish to switch it up. Play with the spices, make it your own. It’s a quick and easy meal though, and that’s why I liked it.

Couscous with Ground Beef and Carrots

Ingredients:

A little more than ½ c homemade chicken broth

½ c couscous

1 T butter

Salt and pepper

1 t lemon juice

2 carrots, peeled and sliced

2 t lemon juice

Dash of salt

1 c ground beef

½ onion, finely chopped

½ clove garlic, minced

½ t garlic powder

Instructions:

1. In a large frying pan, cook ground beef over medium heat until no longer pink, drain off grease. Remove beef and place on paper towel to soak up any extra fat. Sprinkle with salt and garlic powder.

2. Add in onions and garlic to the frying pan, cook until onions are translucent. Add beef back in, heat until warm.

3. Boil chicken broth in small saucepan for about 5 min [re-measure at the end of boiling, if not enough for ½ c, add water]. Cook couscous according to package instructions.

4. In another saucepan, boil water over high heat. Put carrot slices in, boil for about 5 min until tender; remove from heat.

5. Add lemon juice and salt to carrots.

6. Add butter, lemon juice, salt and pepper to couscous.

7. Mix all ingredients together, serve.

Makes one large serving. NOMS: 8