Heather says:
I’d like to thank Bobbie for helping out with the name of this quick beef skillet, I was staring at it last night and drawing a blank. This ground beef cabbage skillet recipe will feed six, more if you serve over cooked rice or noodles. Feel free to play with the ingredients as that would be exactly how I came up with this recipe. I found Cooking Light’s Thai Beef Cups. I used it as a framework to build this recipe for the cooking basics series I’ve been slowly building. If you’re looking for a more traditional beef and cabbage skillet, Bobbie and I both have versions: Bobbie’s Beef and Cabbage Skillet and Heather’s Beef and Cabbage Skillet. All three are great, quick meals, that are handy to have in your kitchen arsenal, cabbage stores for-freaking-ever in the bottom drawer of the fridge and if you’re not vegetarian I ask you why you don’t have at least one emergency pound of ground beef in the freezer. That’s pretty much required to stave off an emergency drive-through run.
As far as the cooking basics series goes, I know so far there are a lot of ground beef recipes, but don’t worry, we’ll start adding chicken, pork, and fish soon enough. I’m still sorting out the whole work life balance thing and not doing so hot at either, if you must know.
So, back to the skillet. Feel free to use red or green cabbage, heck you could use broccoli slaw or any cruciferous greens, as long as they are shredded pretty finely. Just remember the goal isn’t to cook this dish until it’s dead, but rather to keep a little crunch in there for texture. AND if you don’t want to use peanut butter, don’t, just use 1/4 cup of salted peanuts like the original recipe described. Someone swiped my peanuts, that’s the only reason I experimented with -and rather liked- the peanut butter in the first place. Skillets are experiments, give yourself permission to try something different once in a while, who knows you may have a new family favorite. (FYI the minions call any version of beef and cabbage skillet, Kung Fu Skillet as I got tired of them asking what’s for dinner and they were on a Kung Fu Panda kick at the time)
: Thai Inspired Beef and Cabbage Skillet
: A simple one dish meal with a ginger, peanut, twist
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 TBSP olive oil
- 1 onion, sliced thinly
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 tsp ginger, peeled and minced – substitute 1 tsp ground ginger if you need to
- 2 TBSP lime juice -I didn’t measure, just a couple of GOOD squeezes, yes I used the store bought kind, this was a clean out the fridge kind of meal, if you have fresh… awesome.
- 1 1/2 tbsp hoisin sauce -you can use fish sauce if you have it
- 1 small head of red or green cabbage, sliced thinly or shredded
- 1/2 cup or 1/2 a bunch of cilantro, roughly chopped
- 2 TBSP peanut butter or 1/4 cup dry-roasted peanuts
- Soy Sauce to taste – when served
- Heat a heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the olive oil, onion, garlic, and ginger -fresh or ground. Cook, stirring frequently until the onions begin to soften. Reduce the heat if the garlic starts to turn golden. You don’t want to over cook this.
- Add the ground beef to the skillet and cook until no longer pink. Drain well.
- Return the skillet to the burner and completely stir in the lime juice and hoisin sauce.
- Add the cabbage to the skillet and cook until crisp tender.
- Add the peanut butter -if desired- and cilantro (yes, you can omit this, if you’re one of those).
- Stir until thoroughly combined.
- Serve immediately as is or over rice or noodles.
Preparation time: 10 minute(s)
Cooking time: 15 minute(s)
Number of servings (yield): 6
Enjoy!
I can tell by the ingredients list that I would LOVE this, but by that same list, I know I’d be the only one eating it.
Hmm, maybe I can add the ginger and peanut butter just to my own serving. Or…I can use cashews instead and go light on the ginger. Picky people are challenging to cook for, aren’t they?
Looks yummy – saving to Evernote!
Made it tonight and it came out pretty tasty. A nice addition would be some shredded carrots for a bit of colour. If using peanut butter, mix it up with the hoisin sauce and add them in together to avoid getting clumps of peanut butter because of not mixing it in enough
Kung Fu Skillet! That’s perfect! It sounds delicious and has a lot of my favorite stuff in there. I think the shredded carrots would be a great idea.
I love the name! The clearanced chorizo was what fit the budget tonight, so I made a Mexican version. Used cumin, oregano, hot sauce, dried chilies, and lime for seasonings. I only used half a cabbage, because I thought a whole one sounded excessive. It wouldn’t have been. This ended up being very meat heavy with the full pound of chorizo. Thanks for the inspiration!
Sounds Yummo to me! Tasty and healthy!