My Monday Munchies - Making Ground Beef

My aunts gave me the most amazing wedding gift - a Kitchenaid Stand mixer! For someone who likes to bake, this is a great addition to your kitchen. While shopping one day shortly after we were married, I noticed all the accessories for the mixer - juicers, meat grinders, and pasta plates. How cool to be able to make homemade pasta! That one went on my Christmas list. My mom gave them to us, but none of us read the part that said you needed the meat grinder to use the other attachments. Oops!

I had the pasta plates for years before we found the meat grinder brand new and in the box, at a garage sale for $20! I have had the meat grinder for 5-7 years now and have never used it - until today!

We have a grocery store chain in Oklahoma called Crest. Once a month they have a huge meat sale. I can spend $200 on meat and come home with enough meat to feed our family for 2-3 months. 

During one of my last shopping trips I ended up with 3 roasts (the have bags with a variety of cuts - I had 3 ground beef, 2 steak, and 3 roasts). I already had a pork roast and a beef roast in the freezer at home. I also had stew meat. 

When I checked the freezer this week, we still had two roasts! They need to be used soon and I don't really want roast and potatoes in this heat. I hate to spend money when we have food in the freezer. So I decided to test out my meat grinder.

I had no idea what to do! So I Googled "Make your own ground beef" and I found this site. It's so easy! I already have everything I need. So I thawed the roast and got started.

I assembled the meat grinder and attached it to the mixer according to the directions.

I sliced the meat into thin strips. From what I read on the other site, it might be easy to jam my meat grinder, so I wanted to be careful. My Kitchenaid instructions said partially frozen, or really cold meat worked best. Mine was still slightly frozen when I started.

I ran the strips through the grinder with the coarse grind plate. This was quick and easy! (All of the recipes in my instruction manual said to use speed number 4, so that is what I did.)

I changed the plates and reran all the meat through on the fine plate. This took a little longer and I had to use the meat stuffer to press it all through. I was very happy with the results!

I weighed out the meat. I had a little over two pounds. I cooked and seasoned half of it for tacos and froze it. I don't know when we will eat it and I did not want the meat I worked so hard for to go bad! The other pound will become spaghetti sauce for dinner tonight.

Here are some helpful hints from my first experience with the meat grinder:

1. Clear a 2-3 foot radius on your counter. It spits. I had cleared a good space, but I had to wash the knives and knife block, the stove, and a few other things that were not far enough away!

2. Wear an apron. You don't want your clothes covered in meat.

3. If you want great taco meat, grind it twice. For hamburgers, I might just run it through once with the coarse grind plate. 

Will I do this every time I need ground beef? Probably not, but the next time I get a good deal on roast I will be stocking up!