Mexican Ground Beef Skillet

This Mexican Ground Beef Skillet is both really tasty and endlessly adaptable! Make my recipe or make adjustments to make it yours!

You may have noticed that I adore dinners that involve a jumble of ingredients cooked in one pan—recipes like my Southwest Chicken Skillet and Ground Beef and Rice Skillet. Not only are they tasty and satisfying, the one-pan cooking method makes clean-up a snap.

But you know another thing that I love about them? They’re endlessly adaptable. In other words, it’s easy to adjust them to your taste, to what’s on hand, and even your mood.

Here’s how.

Making The Ground Beef Skillet

The recipe starts by browning ground beef in a large skillet. My method for doing that is slightly unusual and gets a nice brown crust on the meat. It’s in the recipe below but more thoroughly explained in this post about how to cook ground beef.

But you don’t have to use beef. If your family prefers ground turkey or chicken, use that. If you’ve got ground pork in the freezer, use that instead. Or use a combination. The recipe would even be good with a combination of any of those and some Mexican chorizo.

Next, I add bell peppers and onion. Use any color of peppers and onions you like!

Then, stir in salsa, broth, beans, and rice. You can use any kind of salsa and beans you prefer. You can use water instead of broth. You can even use any kind of rice you like, but I recommend sticking to white rice varieties because brown rice will take longer to cook.

Along with the liquids, you could also add seasonings if you want—chili powder, ground cumin or coriander, or Mexican oregano, for example.

Bring it all to a simmer, cover the skillet, and cook until the rice is tender and the liquid has absorbed. Then sprinkle on some cheese. What kind of cheese? I like Cheddar and Monterey Jack, but—you guessed it—as long as it goes with Mexican flavors, it’ll work. I had Gouda on hand, so that’s what I used for the batch in these photos. It turned out great!

Try Some Toppings

I hope it goes without saying that the recipe is absolutely delicious as-is. Yet you can definitely enhance it, making it even more your own, by adding Mexican inspired toppings. My photo shows sliced scallions on top with chips and hot sauce on the side.

But chopped cilantro, sour cream, diced avocado, tortillas, and sliced olives would also be great toppers—or any combination thereof. You could even offer a selection of toppings and let your tablemates invent their own version of my Mexican Ground Beef Skillet.

With this recipe, it’s all good.

Enjoy!

Christine

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