Food with My Dude #5: Korean Ground Beef and Rice Bowls

After a few months of cooking, I started getting frustrated about what other beef dishes I could make without exhausting our taste buds. So, I had Stephen go online and find a recipe since he’s pickier than me on some things since I seem to drive myself crazy when I’m viewing multiple recipes and can’t find one I like enough to make!

Korean Ground Beef and Rice Bowls

We wanted to somewhat mimic Bulgogi since Stephen and I went to this yummy Korean House in our area. Bulgogi is so good; although, I don’t particularly care for how greasy and oily it can be. So, Stephen found this dish. It’s not exactly like Bulgogi, but it has a small subtle taste that reminds me of it. Hmm, I should treat myself to some Bulgogi soon!

Here’s the recipe:

• 1 pound lean ground beef (90% lean)
  • [I tend to buy in bulk of the 80%. It works with the dish.]
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• ¼ cup packed brown sugar
• ¼ cup reduced-sodium soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
• ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• ¼ teaspoon pepper
• 2 cups hot cooked white or brown rice
• sliced green onions and sesame seeds for garnish

Price:

$

It’s so easy and cheap for us to make because we have most of the ingredients in our apartment. For a few months, it was a staple meal that we made more of, rather than just spaghetti. Although, I love me some spaghetti!

I decided to mince the garlic using this cheat knife that is fun to use and really cuts things up!

Stephen will mix together the sauce that the beef is supposed to be cooked in.

Easy enough, we put the garlic in to cook with the meat.

Once drained, then we thrown in the sauce mixture!

Then, just let it heat up on the stove top for a little longer, and that’s it!

I was so consumed with keeping track of the meat that I forgot to cook rice on the stove. Instead of having to wait 20 minutes longer for it to cook, I cheated and used our Quick Pot to take care of it for me!

I do have Minute Rice on hand now, but I’m trying to use it as backup. Also, the Quick Pot gives me a little peace of mind to know that I don’t have to worry about the rice to be too done or undercooked.

The rice may still stick to the bottom sometimes, so I have to remember to brush the bottom of it with oil so it doesn’t.

Finally, here’s the final product! This time, the recipe even called for the garnishes. Presentation definitely is the key!

Taste: It’s a bit sweeter in flavor, so the original recipe’s amount of brown sugar could be tweaked a little bit. Overall, it has a good flavor to it! Since it’s not a spicy dish, I put some hot pepper oil in it to kick up the heat, so yum. It really was oilier after that, but at least the rice had some flavor to it!

Rating:

Heat level:

🌶

Side note: We tried making this dish with noodles, just because we loooove noodle dishes, but I’m not sure if it’s because of the noodles we bought or what, but this didn’t even taste like the same recipe! They tasted good when we first made them. I thought the noodles in general tasted somewhat funny, but once it was fixed, it tasted about the same. We just doubled the recipe flavors so the noodles wouldn’t just be plain.

When we had it for leftovers, heating them back up? Even more disappointing. it had this weird nail polish smell to me, and when I tried them, it tasted like they had chemicals in the dish! Not sure what happened, but aren’t using these noodles again, and we have stuck to making them with rice.

I’m sad that I can’t even finish them, but I couldn’t. It hurts my heart to throw away some noodles, but under this circumstance, it has to be done. Needless to say, we will not be using the noodles again to make the dish.

I was super, super sad that these didn’t work out. They look so yummy in the picture!

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Hope you all have an amazing week!