Beef Bean Burrito Filling

Cheap Eat Challenge: Watch as our family of 6 learns to eat on $6/day.

This is no beauty queen.

It's barely even a recipe.

But it contains beans and it passed the Kip-nearly-impossible-test-of-beany-approval, so I'm posting it anyway.

It has a sweetness to it and a wee bit of barbeque-y-ness (which is surely not a word to be found by Webster). These things allow it to pass the picky man test.

Also, it's a great way to reduce the cost of your ground beefy recipes because you can use significantly less beef. Many thanks to Cara from whom this idea sprang.

Beef Bean Burrito Filling
Serves 4-6
Prep and cook time: 10 minutes
Cost: $1.55 (That's as opposed to the $3.99 it would have cost me to brown a pound of ground beef.)
(beef: 1.00--I use beef that is more expensive because though not entirely grass fed, the cows are given more space and are more humanely treated than is the standard; pork and beans: .55)

1/4-1/3 lb ground beef
1 can pork and beans
1/2 tsp taco seasoning if you wish (I skipped it)

Brown the beef in a skillet. Dump in pork and beans and heat up. Cook off some of the liquid if it's too runny for you. Throw it in your burrito with any other burrito fixings you enjoy.

If you think this is the cheating-est recipe you've ever seen and you'd rather die before using a can of pork and beans when you just spent your entire Saturday rehydrating beans because you are a pioneer and a true cheapskate (unlike some people), you can probably replicate (though I can't promise because I totally used the pork and beans because I am a shameless cheater, {but I do make my own BBQ sauce, so I bet this will work} [and, yes, I did just use a parenthetical statement within a parenthetical statement within a parenthetical statement because I am also a hopeless rambler]}). Um, where was I?

Anyway, you can use:
1/4 lb ground beef
1 1/2 C rehydrated pinto beans
1/4 C finely chopped onion
1 clove garlic
1 tsp worcheshire sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp vinegar
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1/4-1/2 C ketchup or tomato paste (depending on how utterly pure and virginal you want this to be--if using the tomato paste, you probably want to double the sauces, vinegar, and brown sugar).

Add the onion to the ground beef and cook. Add the garlic. Add the sauces, vinegar, sugar, and ketchup/tomato paste. Then add the beans. It should have a similar effect (especially if you sort of still cheat and use the ketchup).

Cheaters may not prosper, but they do have shorter ingredient lists.

PRINTABLE RECIPE

P.S. Yes, you do deserve a Saturday sweet, but I didn't post the carrot cake I made this week in an effort to save time by posting this 2-ingredient, er, recipe. (Have I mentioned I'm a cheater.) But worry not, because I have a link for you. I'm planning to try this chocolate chip cookie recipe tomorrow to see if it can compete with either of ours. So if you need a sweet fix, give it a whirl. Or have a look at any of the other recipes on Sweet as Sugar Cookies.

Two Announcements: One Practical, One Exciting

Cheap Eat Challenge: Watch or join us as our family of 6 eats on $6/day.

First--drum roll please--I've finally gotten all of my recipes indexed into a recipe list. You'll find it over on the right side of the blog, listed under, shockingly enough, "Recipes." Go on, have a look. And if anything's goofy, let me know. Much of it was done, um, rather late at night. I kept catching gross alphabetization errors that I'd committed. Feel free to point that, or anything else,  out in the comments.

Secondly...

...we got ducklings yesterday. Six darling ducklings. We chose Pekin ducks which mature into white feathered, yellow beaked adults. Our original plan was to have them as pets while they were small and then to allow them to become wild in the pond and vegetation behind our house. But then I became enamored with the idea of duck eggs. So our plan hatched--ha, I crack me up--haha I cracked me up again...Ahem, sorry about that. Anyway, our plan evolved into one in which the ducks become kind of wild--they learn to forage and search for food behind our house and to pretty much take care of themselves, but we will build them a nesting spot so they can come and lay and we can enjoy their eggs. (They're supposed to be bad setters--they don't like to sit on and hatch their own eggs--so I don't even have to feel guilty about taking the eggs.) Kip also wants them to love us and follow us around and call us George.

We'll see how that plan goes. It might be a little too perfect to actually work. We might end up with ducks dependent on us for food and shelter, or ducks who wander off and do their own thing, or ducks who refuse to lay an egg in any spot locateable by humans at all, no matter how we try to coax them. But for now, they're awfully cute.

In the midst of this duck getting, I've been reading An Omnivore's Dilemna by Michael Pollan. It's been an interesting combination of events. The omnivore's dilemna is, simply put, that we as omnivores have many choices about what to eat, so it's up to us to make the best choices, ones that don't damange our health or destroy the environment upon which we depend. Pollan researches and explores various types of farm--vegetative and aminal; standard and organic, large scale and small scale. And although, in certain ways, Pollan and I are worlds apart politically, our views about food have very much in common. Pollan paints some ugly pictures (and he's certainly not the only one to have done so) about the way large scale industrial animal farming is done--teeny tiny boxes of pens, animals mired in layers of feces, mental and physical animal disease. I'll spare you the details at present and leave you to read them on your own (which I highly recommend). My point (thought I didn't have one, didn't you?) in all this is that already in my barely 24 hours as the owner of a small flock, I've realized something: I care about the ducks. They are in sight, part of our household. This type of intimacy with the things we eat was something that nearly every household experienced until only very recently. And I'm beginning to realize that when we know the animals that are producing our foods, they demand a type of care and respect that cannot be demanded or expected in large scale animal "farming" and production--a type of animal production that is so far removed that we simply forget about it.

Of course we can't all have ducks or chickens or goats or cows. Even if we could some would not want to. I don't see a problem with that at all. As long as we remain mindful of that which we eat. Which, I guess is my question. How do we remain mindful of the foods we eat? How do we take care of them? Especially on the cheap. Especially when it seems that large scale animal producers want us to forget and just eat our meat, like good children. Anybody have any great ideas? Links to good local or other sources? I'd love to hear about them.

Really Healthy Carrot Muffins

Cheap Eat Challenge: Watch as our family of 6 learns to eat on $6/day.

Today I made these muffins for breakfast and a carrot cake for a church party tonight. Talk about carrot schizophrenia.

These muffins are good, but they are very very virtuous--low in sugar, low in fat, full of whole wheat, and containing a decent dose of Vitamin A. If you're family is used to such things, then you can probably serve these plain. If, however, you are used to a muffin that is more of a cupcake or if your family is spoiled and picky like some families out there, these are still worth making, but you may want to dress them up a bit at first. I used orange frosting in the first batch. A little went a long way and the flavors went beautifully together. Today I made some with chocolate chips, because I thought that would appeal to the minions a bit more. They were good, but I'd definitely recommend using milk or white chocolate chips instead of the semi-sweet, which tasted a little too dark against the somewhat stoic muffin.

If it's still too righteous for your family, you can up the sugar to 1/2 C and/or sub out some of the whole wheat flour for all-purpose. I won't tell.

Also, I pureed the carrots in the food processor. This is because if my kids see orange stripes in their muffins, well, the gig is up. However, if you and yourn are not opposed to orange stripes in your food, they're probably great with shredded carrots as well, though I haven't made them as such.

Really Healthy Carrot Muffins
Adapted from Deceptively Delicious
Makes 12 muffins
Prep time: 10-15 minutes
Cook time: 15-20 minutes
Cost: $1.05
(carrots: .40, oil: .04, sugar: .10, egg: .10, milk: .03, flour: .36, other stuff: .02)

Note on dried fruit: The original recipe called for 1/4 C dried chopped apricots, 1/4 chopped pitted prunes. I knew those things would not fly in this family and so omitted them. If you'd like to add them, feel free. I think it might be good with raisins and I think it'd be awesome with coconut.

Note on orange juice concentrate: The original recipe also called for 2 Tbsp orange juice concentrate. I omitted this as well because a) I didn't have it and b) it seems like one of those random ingredients that a person might end up buying just for this recipe. However, if you have it, feel free to add it and tell me how it goes.

1/4 C oil or melted butter (I used oil)
1/4 C brown sugar (white would work too, possibly even better)
1 C carrot puree (2 large carrots, or 10 oz.)
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 Tbsp frozen orange juice concentrate (optional; if you omit, add an extra Tbsp or 2 of sugar)
3 Tbsp milk or buttermilk (I used milk)
2 C whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp allspice

Preheat oven to 350. Line muffin tin with 12 muffin cups.

In food processor puree carrots (it won't be a super wet puree). (Alternately, you can shred them.)

In large bowl, beat oil and sugar. Add puree,egg, milk, vanilla, orange juice concentrate if using, and dried fruit if using. Sift in flour, baking powder, baking soad, cinnamon, and allspice, and stir until just combined. (I always do my dry ingredients lazy style and throw them on top of the wet ingredients and then sort of mix the dry ingredients with a fork and then fold them into the wet batter.) The batter will be extremely thick. Leave batter a little lumpy.

Put in muffin cups and bake about 15 minutes. Don't overdue it or they'll be dry.

Cool. (Note: These muffins are much much better cooled.)

PRINTABLE RECIPE