Stretch Ground Beef Even Further With Help From One Canned Ingredient

If you're on a budget, it's always a good idea to be mindful of ways to stretch out your groceries for as long as possible. Ground beef is already a great asset for this purpose; depending on the recipe, a little can go a long way. But there's a way to stretch ground beef further: Combine it with canned lentils, which are cheap and easy to use.

Like beans and chickpeas, lentils are part of the legume family. There are various types of lentils — brown, green, black, red, and yellow — all of which have their own unique taste and can serve different purposes. When it comes to combining with ground beef, the best option is likely brown lentils, which are the most common type. Brown lentils have a pretty mild taste – with some earthy notes — that should blend well with ground beef and spices. Meanwhile, red lentils have sweet notes, which won't work well with beef, and green lentils stay firm even after cooking, so they wouldn't work as well, texture-wise. Of course, those types of lentils have other purposes, and you can read more about those in our guide to the best ways to use the most common lentil varieties.

Importantly, canned lentils are already pre-cooked and ready to go, so using them for the purpose of stretching ground beef will be super easy. Start with your favorite recipe — perhaps something like ground beef with onions and peppers — and add the lentils when it's ready. Since canned lentils come stored in liquid, it's a good idea to drain them before adding them to the ground beef.

As for a ratio, a good place to start is ¾ cup of cooked lentils for each pound of ground beef. Of course, you can adjust that according to your taste. Maybe you want to use fewer lentils the first time to ensure you enjoy the taste. The more lentils you add, the further your combo will stretch.

After finding the ratio that works for you, all that's left to do is come up with ideas for how you'd like to use the lentil ground beef. Some ideas include sloppy Joes, beef burritos, stuffed peppers, or a Southwestern taco bake.