40+ Quick Meals Using Ground Beef or Shredded Chicken

So the whole Menu planning thing on this blog was pretty short lived huh? I think I realized why. I'm more of a "pantry principle planner" than a specific day by day menu planner. What I mean by that is that I generally stock up and have on hand 90% of the ingredients for 90% of the meals that I make 90% of the time. Approximately. lol.

Beefygeek has recently started a new job that has him coming home at later, less predictable hours and this has sent me back to my go-to repertoire of quick, easy meals that I can make during nap time or with a baby crawling around my feet.

I've been complaining about how expensive my foodie blog habit has been lately, so I decided that I'll be the change I want to see. As epic as that sounds...

To help me, and maybe you... I've come up with a list of about forty meals that use either ground beef or shredded chicken (two of the easiest, cheapest, quickest to cook and defrost meats IMHO.) I'm going to keep this list on hand in the kitchen so I can quickly pick something for dinner when need be. Here goes:

Ground Beef (or ground turkey if you HAVE to. But most of these allow for draining and even rinsing the fat off before using. A few articles here and here.)

1. hamburgers
2. spaghetti
3. tacos
4. taquitos
5. burritos
6. enchiladas
7. quesadillas
8. sloppy joes
9. chili
10. shepherd's pie
11. meatloaf
12. stuffed peppers 
13. "stir fry" (basically just cook up the ground beef with onions, veggies, and seasonings and serve over rice)
14. omelets
15. pizza
16. homemade hamburger helper
17. meatballs
18. lasagne
19. Beef Stroganoff (never made it, but it's on the to-try list. I actually have some leftover egg noodles and sour cream right now...)
20. any casserole (there are probably at least fifteen variations here alone. just use Amy Dacyzyn’s good old Tightwad Casserole formula.) 
21. soup (Although I've honestly never made soup with ground beef; I found some interesting recipes online. If you have any go-to recipes, please share!)

Shredded Chicken

1. Chicken Pot Pie (I often top with biscuit dough instead of pie crust, it's just easier) 
2. Super easy pot pie variation: mix and cook sauce with meat and veggies on stove top and serve over rice or noodles
3. white sauce/alfredo over noodles
4. enchiladas (red or white)
5. white chili
6. chicken salad
7. add to PW's Sesame noodles
8. add chicken to lettuce salad, Cesar or otherwise
9. tacos
10. fajitas
11. burritos
12. taquitos
13. quesadillas
14. add to any rice-o-roni/hamburger helper type thing, either homemade or bought on sale!
15. chicken divan
16. sandwiches
17. pulled barbeque chicken
18. add to stir fried vegetables (not as good as freshly stir fried chicken but super fast if you're in a pinch)
19. wraps
20. any casserole (use same formula as ground beef)
21. about a million chicken soups (chicken noodle, tortilla, wild rice, vegetable... use soups like casseroles: to use up whatever is in your fridge)

I'm realizing Mexican food is super easy looking at this list lol! With some notable exceptions (lasagne being the most obvious) these are cheap and you probably already have the ingredients in your kitchen (or you should!) I'm going to go back through and link to some favorite recipes, just so i have them all in one place, but that's about it for now! What are your favorite uses for these quick proteins?

Whatcha Eatin'? #1

I confess, I am terrible with planning menus for the week. I have a hard time enjoying the process even though I know it makes life so much easier. (Especially without a car to run out for ingredients at the last minute.) So I'm going to try to post here to keep me accountable and share recipes. We'll see how I do...

This week, in no particular order:

White Chicken Enchiladas with Spanish Rice
Chicken Tortilla Soup*
Crust-less Sausage and Spinach Quiche
Beef Stir Fry
Minestrone soup* with no knead bread
Chicken Piccata* with steamed veggies and Orzo salad*

And one desert because we're having company (such a great excuse isn't it?):

Homemade Oreos*

*indicates new recipe. Five new recipes this week. This is not representive of an average week for me. I usually try maybe one new recipe every seven days or so, but I'm on a foodie kick lately.

Now... This will probably (okay, definitely) run over into next week because each of these meals will last more than one day (and neither of us minds eating leftovers a few days in a row) but these are the recipes I'm shopping for today.