Ways to Reuse Your Go-To Dinner: Ground Beef

Most of the time, I purposely cook more than it is needed for my family dinner, so that I can re-use the leftovers to make a completely different dinner the day after.

One of my most used ingredients is pure minced beef or ground beef. There is so much you can do with minced beef and two of my favorites are Bolognese sauce and Chili con carne.

I usually buy premium lean ground beef (5 percent fat content) so that it has reduced fat content, as fat can also be an IBS trigger. Alternatively, you could also use turkey mince.

I am cooking dinner for four people, and as I am aiming at using half of the meat for the following day's dinner, I use 1 kg of minced beef, which is around 2.20 lb.

1 ingredient, 2 IBS-friendly dinners

These are not recipes as such, I mainly want to show how you can reuse the main ingredient (minced beef) for 2 completely different dinners.

For the first dinner, I use the entire amount of minced meat to prepare a very tasty bolognese sauce. I add a large can of diced/chopped tomatoes, a teaspoon of oregano, and a teaspoon of basil. The sauce would not be as tasty without garlic and onion, and obviously, those are triggers for IBS, instead, I use garlic and onion infused oils, as they are a perfectly safe replacement.

I start by browning a finely chopped carrot and a celery stalk. Be mindful with the celery, as it contains mannitol (a polyol) and if you can’t handle it, keep to the safe quantity of 10 grams, which is about a quarter of a medium stalk. This means that if you are cooking for 4 people or making 4 servings, 1 medium stalk should be ok, plus we are only going to use half of the sauce for the first dinner anyway.

I use half of the sauce on low FODMAP spaghetti and save the other half for the next day's dinner when I will use it to make Chili con Carne. Store the bolognese sauce in the fridge once it has cooled down.

Do not be scared of chili!

Chili may seem like a dish that could easily trigger IBS symptoms, but by making a few changes to the normal recipe, you can transform it into a super delicious low FODMAP version. Unfortunately, red kidney beans are not suitable, but by replacing them with canned black beans, you can make a tasty chili.

It is important to drain and rinse well the black beans before adding them to the meat sauce, in order to eliminate the oligos that have leached into the liquid in the can. Then it’s time to add your spices, the store-bought Mexican spice mix is often not suitable, therefore add the individual dried spices to taste (approximately 1 teaspoon cumin, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 teaspoon pure chili powder, ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper). Once it's ready serve it on top of boiled rice and if you wish also add some corn chips. I also love to add a teaspoon of sour cream and a little shredded cheese.

This is my way of re-using my go-to dinner, what is yours? Feel free to comment below!