Ready in less than 30 minutes, this beef and kale stir-fry makes THE ideal nutritious and family-pleasing weeknight meal.
I created this Ground Beef and kale stir-fry for the most important men in my life. Growing up, stir-fry was on my family’s weekly meal rotation because it was one of my Dad’s favorite meals. Once I started cooking for myself I thought I was finally rid of the stir-fry frenzy until I met my husband. The only thing Ted has ever cooked for me has been stir-fry, mainly because it’s one of those one-pot, easy clean up meals.
Can’t blame the guy— those are all good reasons! So in honor of Father’s Day and two men who deserve delicious and nutritious food for being the best fathers and friends, here’s a stir-fry recipe I know they’ll be requesting weekly. My Mom will thank me for a new recipe to add to her stir-fry rotation!
True story: the first meal I made for Ted at his place went a little something like this: Ted walked into the kitchen while I plated dinner and said, “Whoa! I didn’t know I had this many dishes.” I pretty much had used every pot and pan in his kitchen to make dinner. This stir-fry man only needed one pan! And didn’t blink an eye at any other pan in his kitchen.
I’m not sure why I turned my nose up at stir-fry when I was growing up. Now I can’t get enough of this Asian-inspired dish. For starters, most stir-fries are PACKED with vegetables. There’s no such thing as too many vegetables in my book. This Ground Beef and kale stir-fry also includes a food my family loves more than vegetables: beef.
Ground Beef is economical, nutritious, and easily takes on the flavor of this simple stir-fry sauce! The entire family, including my somewhat particular eating toddler, was going back for seconds of the carrots and Ground Beef. Joey’s take on the kale? Eh, he passed that up. But that left more kale for Mom and Dad!
Happy Father’s Day to all the stir-fry requesting, one-pan cleaning dads out there! And also to my father in law who appreciates the meals I make— I’m not sure what he thinks about stir-fry but I’m almost positive he’d like this one too!
Celebrate Dad this #FathersDay with a nutritious and full of flavor beef and kale stir-fry! Share on X
- 1 cup of uncooked brown rice
- ½ cup of beef broth
- ½ cup of soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons of rice wine vinegar
- 2 tablespoons of toasted sesame oil
- 1 teaspoon of ground ginger
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon of sugar
- 1 pound of lean Ground Beef, 93% lean or leaner
- 3 cups of kale, chopped
- 1 cup of red cabbage, sliced
- 1 cup of carrots, shredded
- Cook rice as directed on package.
- In a small bowl, combine broth, soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil, ginger, garlic and sugar. Stir to combine.
- Heat large nonstick skillet over medium heat until hot. Add Ground Beef; cook 8 to 10 minutes, breaking into small crumbles and stirring occasionally. Pour off drippings.
- Add stir-fry sauce to ground beef; cover and cook 4 to 6 minutes or until vegetables are crisp-tender, stirring occasionally. Serve vegetable mixture over rice.
Some of my favorite flavors in this dish! Love how easy and fast it is to make. Will be making soon. 🙂
Thanks so much Janice!
I never would’ve thought to use ground meat in stir-fry! Looks like a great recipe
It’s my favorite way to make stir fry!
Great recipe and I love that you made it super easy with ground beef! too funny about your husband and the pots and pans-Mine (who is in charge of dishes) always complains that I use all the dishes in the house when I cook too 🙂 Pinned this and will definitely be making soon!
Maybe it’s the curse of being married to a RD?!
okay, that face, its priceless! love that he even tried it! and yay for kale, and beef, and all things on this dish!
Thanks my friend!!
Oh my gosh this is my kind of meal. And my whole family’s kind of meal!! I love the pics of your son, he is adorable!!!
Thanks Aggie!! He’s a ham!
Used this recipe tonight as a starter for an impromptu stir fry party.
Used 6 tbsp finely chopped fresh organic garlic, and 6 tbsp finely chopped fresh ginger.
Used Safeway Open Nature grass fed angus ground beef 85% lean / 15% fat.
Cooked beef with half of the garlic and ginger.
Stir fry sauce was lacking piquancy; augmented with juice from 2 organic lemons, 1 1/2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar, 1/2 bunch chopped organic cilantro leaves; used 1 tsp molasses instead of sugar.
Added additional vegetables: 2 stalks organic broccoli, chopped; 1 organic leek, halved and chopped.
Finished by simmering for 4 minutes with solution of 1 tbsp organic corn starch + 3 tbsp water, to thicken sauce.
This was fantastic!
I love how you made some simple additions!!!! I might have to try your version instead lol
WOW! There´s an awful lot of salt in that! You have half a cup of soy sauce in here for 4 portions. That is 125ml of soy sauce in total, therefore 31.25ml per serving. Soy sauce has approximately 307mg of sodium per 5ml teaspoon. That works out to over 1,900mg per serving. That´s more than the recommended daily limit of 1,500mg in one dish! Even with reduced sodium soy sauce, you have 1,200mg per serving.
Thanks for your input and for doing the math Jonathan. I guess I never realized how much I was adding- bad dietitian! Now I’ll be redoing the recipe 🙂 thanks again!
I had kale and ground beef and quickly googled a stirfry recipe and this came up. It was perfect! My whole family including the 3 year old gobbled it up. It will become part of our rotation.
Woot woot! So glad you found the recipe and everyone enjoyed it!
When do you add the vegetables?
Glad to see I’m not the only one who caught this omission! I was reading through the comments and was questioning my sanity (or reading ability), but re-read several times and it’s definitely NOT there.
It’s pretty unbelievable that this “recipe” got so many enthusiastic responses. It doesn’t even tell you when to add the vegetables! Going by this recipe you make sauce, you cook ground beef, add sauce to beef, and then you magically serve “vegetable mixture.”