Real Food Sloppy Joes :: Compare To Manwich & Other Canned Sloppy Joe Sauces!

I know that so many of you may be on the new year kick of cleaning up your diet, maybe doing a fast or cleanse, maybe a 30 day program or something. Those are all great things to give you a kick start – but for those of you with kiddos in the house, that kinda stuff doesn’t fly with them!

And those kids deserve to have real food to eat too! You can still clean up the way your family is eating and keep the food something that children that maybe aren’t used to real food will eat.

Sloppy Joes were a staple in my home growing up and I know it is a kid favorite in many homes. The trouble with the stuff from the can lies in the high fructose corn syrup, preservatives, and some brands add color to make it brighter. That’s a pretty ugly combo for kids trying to focus on school work or having a good night of sleep!

We pack a nourishing punch in this sloppy joe dinner by using grassfed beef which far exceeds the nutritional profile of conventional beef.

I also use sprouted red beans in my mix. And there are 2 reasons for this. The first is to stretch my meat budget. While I think I get a pretty great price for grassfed beef where I live, with 3 bottomless pits to feed (make that 4 to include my husband!) it just makes good stewardship sense to stretch my budget where I can. We digest sprouted beans very well and you can’t tell the difference in the texture of the mixture. Sprouted beans also bump up the nutrient level as the sprouting makes more of their nutrients available to absorb (it also takes away the “gassy” in the beans!). If you don’t tolerate beans in your diet, you can just double up on the beef!

We use the Sami’s Bakery gluten free buns for these, but if you have a favorite bun or make your own, go for it! I would recommend staying away from the traditional buns you probably grew up on as they are just full of junk. Something sprouted would be great, or just homemade. If you are grain free you may have it in a big lettuce bowl, or pour it over a baked potato – it is SO good and we actually do it this way often.

This recipe makes a LOT. I do it this way so I can make a mess in a pot once and store away leftovers for quick pull out dinners on busy weeks. If you don’t want this much leftover, then simply half the recipe.

 For the real food potato chips you see in the photos above, check out THIS post!

Let me know how the kids like them!

This post was shared at Fat Tuesday & Real Food Wednesday!