Replacing ground beef?
By katsmeow1213
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
United States
November 5, 2009 12:49pm CST
Do you use any creative ways to replace the ground beef in your regular family meals?
Earlier this week I made cabbage rolls with ground turkey instead of ground beef. Today I'm using some more ground turkey in a cabbage soup... I used cabbage, carrots, celery, onion, lentils, ground turkey, and a bit of garlic. Can't wait to see how it turns out, it smells wonderful!
Last night was taco night, that's a meal my whole family loves! And we usually have it at least once a month. Normally we will use seasoned ground beef. However last night we did not. We used chopped chicken breast instead.. cooked it and seasoned it the same way we would ground beef. But it's not ground meat, it's cubed.
We all really liked it. It's not the first time we've replaced our ground beef in tacos with chicken, and it certainly won't be the last.
6 people like this
17 responses
@cynthiann (18602)
• Jamaica
5 Nov 09
It sounds like you are eating very healthily. I have not eaten cabbage soup with ground turkey before, let me know how it turns out. I have used chicken in tacos and it is so good. You are so creative in your cooking Kat.
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
6 Nov 09
The soup was rather bland and flavorless... certainly not a hit with my family. It smelled much better than it tasted!
That's a pity!
@dawnald (85146)
• Shingle Springs, California
5 Nov 09
Well, now that my husband has developed gout, I'm going to have to try. I have used turkey burgers in the past and ground turkey, but not regularly or anything. More grains, more veggies, less meat, especially beef, pork, lamb and certain kinds of fish. Sigh.
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
5 Nov 09
I thought pork was "the other white meat"?
No one in my family is a big fan of fish, and we can't have a totally meatless menu. I doubt we could survive on chicken and ground turkey alone, so I am keeping pork in our diet, mostly in the form of pork chops and pork roasts, things like sausage and bacon are out!
1 person likes this
@dawnald (85146)
• Shingle Springs, California
5 Nov 09
Pork is on the list of things to avoid. I couldn't do just chicken and turkey either, but I can cut down on the other meats.
@lilybug (21107)
• United States
10 Nov 09
I actually use ground turkey more often than I use ground beef. There is this one roll of ground turkey at Walmart that is one $1 a one pound roll here that already has the taco seasoning in it. They also have it in Italian. The Italian is a little bit spicy, but the kids like it in spaghetti sauce.
@3SnuggleBunnies (16374)
• United States
8 Nov 09
I have replaced my ground beef with ground turkey as well. It's alot cheaper if you buy it in the rolls, one of our grocery chains has them 10 for $10 on sale or Aldi's is $1.19 wich is cheaper than buying "the turkey store" brand name ground turkey. Anything we used ground beef in we now use turkey. And in time you may notice as I have less occurances of heartburn, less fat intake ect. And of course it's quite a bit cheaper per pound, since beef has gone up alot in the past 15 yrs. I remember buying hamburger on sale for .88/lb not paying $1.99 on sale liek you do now for the higher fat content stuff 
@jesssp (2712)
• Canada
7 Nov 09
Ground turkey is an excellent substitute for anything that calls for ground beef. I also like to have chicken tacos now and then instead of plain 'ol beef. One thing that I will do with tacos is use half extra lean ground beef and half brown rice. With the spices and sauces you can't tell that there's beef missing - plus the brown rice adds some whole grains. It's better for you and cheaper as well.
@yell0wbell (128)
• Philippines
7 Nov 09
it is not easy to find ground turkey here in our country, so i use ground chicken intead. specially if i will be cooking for my mom. he is 77 years old already and can nly eat a few choices of food. mostly fish andchicken without the skin. so she used ground chicken on food she will eat. i love tacos but not yet tried to put ground chicken instead. i will give it a try. i guess turkey taste better than chicken. to bad we dont have that here
@rogue13xmen13 (14402)
• United States
6 Nov 09
You can use ground turkey, pork, chicken, and ham. There are so many alternatives to beef. I love anything with chicken and turkey in it.
@ersmommy1 (12588)
• United States
6 Nov 09
We have used chicken in tacos and burritos instead of beef. My sister in law is friends with a strict vegetarian. So once, I made chili with Boca crumbles. It was good. I will have to try the soup idea. It sounds great.
@SomeCowgirl (32191)
• United States
6 Nov 09
I've had ground turkey for taco meat before, but that's the only thing I can think we've ever substituted. I guess we only cook about a handful of things I can think of that meat could be substituted with.
@ZephyrSun (7381)
• United States
6 Nov 09
I raise my own chickens and we use a lot of chicken for so many different things, I haven't taken any of my turkeys in this year and it's so expensive to buy. About another month and I'll have 7 turkeys and I'm sure we will have a lot of different turkey dishes then LOL
@lelin1123 (15595)
• Puerto Rico
6 Nov 09
Yes I have used ground turkey for chili, spaghetti sauce and hamburgers. Its a great change from ground beef. I stopped eating ground beef over a year ago. I have replaced it with alot more turkey and chicken. Its healthy and taste better to me.
@dorannmwin (36392)
• United States
6 Nov 09
When I was younger we used a lot of ground turkey in our house because of my father's heart problems. The thing was, we really didn't get along with it that well. To this day, I can barely stand to eat turkey. So what we do is eat more dinners that involve chicken than do ground beef. I also only buy the leanest ground beef that I can find. I realize that ground beef isn't the most healthy choice that we can make, but if it makes us all happy, then I probably won't change it.
@epicure35 (2814)
• United States
6 Nov 09
Many today feel ground beef is a bit "iffy" in the health department, so replacing it is actually easy. Chicken, turkey, mushrooms, even beans can be substituted easily in almost all everyday recipes. Vegetables, tofu, eggs, any meat "substitute" will work in most recipes, again, seasoned as you would do with ground beef. Fish works well, too, either ground, or in fillet portions, like fish tacos. A lot of the taste and texture can be approximated even with eggplant, also rice, especially brown rice - it's a good chew. Ground nuts work, too. Add some cheese to bulk up flavor, and you can create a masterpiece.
@deebomb (15304)
• United States
5 Nov 09
I often use ground turkey instead of pork or beef. I make my own turkey sausage and burgers. I use ground turkey in almost every thing that calls for ground beef. If I want a beefy flavor I add some beef seasoning. I also replace beef in other dishes that call for beef chunks with chicken or turkey pieces. Trying to get away from beef because of high cholesterol. I don't eat pork at all any more since I learned that pork can have trichinosis and it can't be killed no matter how much it is cooked.
