Korean ground beef bowl
30 min · 39 g protein · 443 cals / serving
Ground beef browned until crusty, then glazed in a sticky soy, garlic, ginger and gochujang sauce that tastes like bulgogi in a fraction of the time. It goes over jasmine rice with a pile of ice-cold quick-pickled cucumber, sweet shredded carrot and sesame spinach, and a shower of scallions and toasted sesame. Sweet, salty, a little spicy and very crunchy.
Ingredients
Rice
- 2/3 cup jasmine rice, rinsed
- 1 cup water
Quick-pickled cucumber
- 3 small (or 1 large English cucumber) cucumbers, thinly sliced
- 3 tbsp rice vinegar
- 1 tsp granulated sugar
- 1/3 tsp salt
Sesame spinach
- 8 cups baby spinach
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- a pinch salt
- 1 1/3 lb ground beef (95% lean)
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp ginger, finely grated
- 6 green onions, sliced, whites and greens kept apart
Sauce
- 3 tbsp reduced sodium soy sauce
- 1 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 tbsp gochujang
To serve
- 2 medium carrots, coarsely grated or cut in matchsticks
- 2 tsp toasted sesame seeds
- 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes (optional)
Steps
- Put the rice and water in a small pot with a pinch of salt, bring to a boil, then cover and cook on the lowest heat for 12 minutes. Turn off the heat and leave it covered while you cook everything else.
- Toss the cucumber with the rice vinegar, sugar and salt in a bowl and put it in the fridge. It turns crisp and tangy in the 15 minutes the rest takes.
- Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat, add the spinach with a splash of water and toss until just wilted, about 1 minute. Tip it into a sieve, press out the liquid, then toss it with the sesame oil and the pinch of salt and set it aside.
- Stir the soy sauce, brown sugar and gochujang together. Wipe out the skillet, set it over high heat, add the beef and press it flat; leave it alone for 3 minutes so the underside browns deeply, then break it up and cook until no pink remains (160°F), 4–5 minutes more. Push it aside, add the garlic, ginger and scallion whites to the cleared spot for 30 seconds, then pour in the sauce and toss until the beef is glossy and the sauce has cooked down, about 2 minutes.
- Fluff the rice and divide it between four bowls. Top with the beef and set the sesame spinach, the drained cucumber and the carrot alongside, then finish with the scallion greens, sesame seeds and pepper flakes if you like heat.
Good to know
Can I use another meat?
Ground turkey or chicken works with the same sauce; brown it just as hard, since leaner meat needs the crust for flavour. Ground pork is the richest version, at about 47 instead of 63.
How do I make it spicier?
Double the gochujang (it's about the same score), or add a spoonful of kimchi to each bowl; its sourness is great against the sweet glaze. Leftover kimchi juice in the cucumber pickle also works.
Does it keep?
The beef keeps 3 days in the fridge and reheats well; keep the cucumber separate so it stays crunchy. It makes very good lunch boxes.
Alternatives
Per
- Calories
- 101
- Protein
- (37%)
- 9 g
- Fat
- (24%)
- 3 g
- Carbohydrates
- (39%)
- 10 g
- of which sugar
- 2 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sodium
- 271 mg
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. General guidance, not medical advice. Talk to your prescriber. How
As written, 1771 kcal goes into the pot and 2083 g of ingredients comes out as about 1760 g of food: 101 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.