Beef Recipes: Ground Beef, Steak and Stir-Fry Ideas

How we cook beef on a weeknight

For ground beef, press it into an even layer and leave it alone for several minutes until a dark crust forms underneath. That crust is where the deep, meaty flavor in chili and bolognese comes from. Stir too early and the beef simmers in its own juices instead.

For flank or skirt steak, find the lines of muscle fiber running along the meat and slice across them as thinly as you can. Fifteen minutes in the freezer firms the steak so it slices cleanly, and short fibers are what make a stir-fry tender.

Brown in batches when a pan looks crowded. Two quick batches are faster than one batch that never gets hot enough to sear.

Short on time? Korean Ground Beef Bowls is the quickest here at 20 min, with 5 min of hands-on work.