I like making up dump meals for my slow cooker, meals that are ready to be dumped into my slow cooker, meaning I need to brown my ground beef ahead of time. I started using my slow cooker to get the job done quickly and all at once.
Browning Ground Beef in Your Slow Cooker
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I buy the largest package of ground beef at my Costco, bring it home and dump it in my slow cooker. Why? Because it saves so much time when I go to make a batch of freezer slow cooker dump meals, I don’t have to dirty every frying pan in the house, I also don’t have to stand over a hot stove.
What you need:
- ground beef
How to brown ground beef in your Crock pot:
I have a large 7qt slow cooker, so I dump the whole package in. Make sure to break up your ground beef. Cook on high for 3-4 hours or low for 8 hours.
Once it is cooked through, because I like my ground beef to be finer I’ll use my potato masher to break it up easily.
I find my ground beef is a lot less greasy later on after cooking it in the slow cooker. See all that gross greasy on top?
We have a tiny little kitchen sink that is useless with the exception that my large colander fits perfectly in it. I dump all the ground beef into the colander for the grease to drain off, plus I rinse it off with warm water.
After your ground beef cools, you can bag it up to freeze for cooking later, or bag it in dump meals as I do.
This is a time saver! Do this when you buy those large packages, when they go on sale and you stock up. My husband makes fun of me once in awhile when he sees all the ground beef I have stock piled in the freezer.
Some of the recipes that I use this ground beef in would be:
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