
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.
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!
Real Food Sloppy Joes
Ingredients
- 2 lb grassfed ground beef
- 6 cups <a href="https://www.raisinggenerationnourished.com/2014/03/sprouting-beans-soups-stir-frys-wraps-dips-salads/" target="_blank" title="Sprouting Beans For Soups Stir Frys, Wraps, Dips, and Salads">sprouted/cooked red beans - this is about a pound of dry beans (OR an additional 2lbs pound of beef if you are leaving the beans out)
- 2 medium onions chopped
- 2 green peppers chopped (I actually just buzz up the onion and pepper in my processor quick!)
- 1 head of garlic minced
- 2 ½ cups organic ketchup watch ingredients – no HFCS
- ¼ cup organic mustard again – watch ingredients!
- 2 – 4 TB pure maple syrup
- 1 cup bone broth or water
- 1 TB chili powder
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes more if you want more kick
- Sea salt/pepper to taste
- ¼ cup arrowroot
or tapioca flour
mixed in a little water for thickening
Instructions
- In a big soup pot cook the onion and green pepper in a good ¼ cup or so of friendly fat (butter, coconut oil, or lard) for a 5ish minutes with a pinch of salt to bring out the juices and sweeten.
- Add the garlic and cook for a minute.
- Add the ground beef and brown through.
- Add the cooked beans, ketchup, mustard, maple syrup, water, chili powder, and red pepper flakes and bring to a simmer. Simmer about 10ish minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Add the arrowroot/water mixture and heat through until thickened.
- Serve on a bun of your choosing, or if you are grain free it is delicious in a big lettuce bowl, or over a baked potato!
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!
I really wish to try this…..but I do not understand about the ground beef drippings do you drain it first? or is it okay to cook the ground beef with all its fat ?
Any help would be appreciated -Thanks
Hi Deb! I’m cooking with grassfed ground beef which is super lean and doesn’t lend a lot of grease – if you are using store bought (which is totally fine btw!), it might need to be drained!
They look so good! I will have to sprout some beans this week!
Let me know how the boys like them 🙂
Holy YUM! These sloppy joes sound amazing! I’ll be whipping these up soon. Thank for the great recipe!!!
Thanks Jessica! Enjoy them!
I love homemade sloppy joes … and I love how you sprout the beans to stretch the meat/budget. That’s such a great idea! Beautiful photos too!
Thank you Emily!
Mmm, the sprouted beans always make me so happy to see! Love that photo. Yummy ingredients!! Thanks for sharing this classic comfort food!
You’re welcome!
A fantastic nutrient dense alternative to the canned options for sure! I need to get a face-to-face demo on sprouting beans and how to store and prepare them (I don’t eat many but would be willing to try more if I knew how to do this). Next on the how-to list. Pinned and shared. =)
Thank you Jessica! I hope you enjoy them – the beans are super easy -great science experiment for Blaise 🙂
These pics are making me salivate! Being grain free your lettuce bowl idea is perfect!
Love this! I can’t remember the last time I had sloppy joes.
I’ve never eaten a prepared sloppy joe, but I love finding out how to make it better and last a little longer. I pinned for future reference.
Great April!
Forget kid-pleasers, my husband would be ALL over these!
Haha! Right Kylie 😉
Where do you buy Sami’s bakery buns at?
Hi Amy! Our health food store here carries them – you live near me correct? Check the freezer section 🙂
Health Hutt? I have one in North Muskegon I go to, I’ll give it a shot! Having a hard time finding a bread my littlest can have. She is allergic to egg, peanut, wheat and corn (and a few other things). I try to make things homemade, but I haven’t made too many breads without wheat and most I am finding use some sort of nut or eggs or corn. I have a lot of experimenting to do!
Yes Amy Health Hutt should have it!
Just made these for the second time… they are SO good!
Love that Nicole! We love these too!
Hi there. There is a broken link in the actual recipe so I am not sure what the amount of beans should be. It looks like 6 cups?