Slip Fiber Into Any Ground Beef Dish By Mixing In This Cheap Pantry Staple

It's no secret that protein-heavy meals can fall short on fiber, which is essential for healthy digestion. It's also getting pretty expensive to keep up with meat prices these days, with a pound of ground beef running at around $6.79. But there's an easy way to kill two birds with one stone by mixing ground beef with lentils, which are a cheap and tasty pantry staple.

You might not think of fibermaxxing when you're whipping up a batch of sloppy joes, but hear us out. One cup of cooked lentils packs in around 15.6 grams of fiber, which is pretty impressive considering ground beef has none. Lentils also have a naturally earthy, meaty flavor and texture, so they blend right in with whatever you've got planned for dinner, be it spaghetti sauce, chili, or our Greek-inspired beef and potato bake.

It doesn't take any special cooking skills to make lentils, and you can find store-brand options for less than a dollar per can in most places, with dried lentils offering even more bang for your buck. They also add extra plant-based protein to boot, so you can add more fiber, more nutritional value, and easily stretch your ground beef for very little effort.

Adding lentils to ground beef is easy, but it's not entirely foolproof. The most important step is finding the right ratio of beef to lentils so that the dish still tastes beefy while scoring that boost of fiber. The ratio also depends on the type of dish you're cooking. Dishes like chili and taco, which have big flavors, can handle more lentils, while recipes like burgers where beef takes center stage call for a lighter touch.

Recipes like taco meat and a simple weeknight bolognese are probably the easiest way to add some lentils. Start with ¾ of a cup to 1 ½ cups for every pound of ground beef and see how you like the results. Recipes with lots of sauce or gravy, like shepherd's pie, are very forgiving volume-wise, so a few lentils will not substantially change the flavor or texture of the finished product. For these dishes, you can also use canned lentils that are drained and rinsed in a colander. They're a little mushier than stovetop lentils, but between the texture of the beef and the many spices and seasonings, that won't matter, and you won't need to do any extra cooking. For any of these recipes, you won't need to mash or process the lentils, just mix them into the meat when you're cooking on the stove and add your seasonings and sauces as normal.

Burgers and meatloaf are trickier when it comes to adding lentils, since the meaty texture is the whole point. Start with a smaller ratio of ½ to 1 cup lentils per pound of meat. Too many lentils can ruin the structure, and it won't stick together.

Canned lentils can work, but dried lentils cooked on the stove are often a better choice because you have more control over the final texture. Lentils cooked on the stove tend to hold their shape better, while canned lentils are softer from sitting in liquid, and excess moisture can make your meat mixture fall apart. Either way, be sure to drain the lentils thoroughly before you add them to the meat. Also, the dry texture of stove-cooked lentils can actually help bind the burgers together, kind of like breadcrumbs.

Once the lentils are drained, lightly mash them with a hand masher, or give them a couple of pulses in a food processor before mixing them with the burger meat to make the blending a little easier. And, of course, don't forget to season the mixture with more salt and pepper to account for the extra volume.