How To Add Fat To Lean Ground Beef?

A fantastic way to flavor and texture your dishes is to add fat to lean ground beef. I also discovered that ground beef with a higher fat content will cook more slowly than ground beef with a lower fat content.

You’ll be able to make delicious dishes with your lean ground beef in no time with the help of these suggestions and techniques.

Ways to add fat to ground beef

Various methods of adding fat to ground beef are available. Here are the best things to add:

Beef fat (tallow)
Bacon or bacon fat
Butter
Chorizo
Sausages
Cheese
A fattier type of mince

Keep reading to find out more about each option.

This is my personal favorite. Lean ground beef can become something truly magical by adding beef fat.

Specifically using BACK FAT is the secret to using beef fat.

Compared to regular beef fat, back fat is more “buttery” and has a melt-in-your-mouth texture.
Many butchers give it away for FREE. Additionally, it won’t cost much even if your neighborhood butcher decides to sell it.

How to add beef fat (tallow) to ground beef

Assuming your tallow is prepared, the next step will require either a food processor or a specialty meat grinder.

Before adding them to your food processor, make sure the beef and tallow are both VERY COLD. Before processing them, I advise putting them in the freezer for about 20 minutes. You’ll get mushy ground beef if the meat is too warm and smears.
The same applies to your grinding equipment. At least an hour before you need to use it, freeze it.
Calculate the amount of tallow required to achieve the desired lean to fat ratio. Skip to this section where I go into more detail if you’re unsure.
Just enough tallow and ground beef should be combined in the blender to achieve proper mixing. Don’t overdo this step. Too much handling can also result in a mushy texture.

Ask your butcher if they’d be willing to work in the fat for you if you don’t have a grinder or food processor at home.

Add bacon or bacon grease

Bacon is here to save the day. When it comes to adding bacon to ground beef, you have three choices:

Prior to cooking/making patties, grind raw bacon and combine with the ground beef.
Add cooked bacon to your ground beef
Use the bacon fat/drippings

Before cooking, combine ground (or finely chopped) raw bacon with your beef to make a deliciously fatty and flavorful patty.

However, it necessitates completing the cooking process for the burger. There shouldn’t be any raw bacon pieces in the center of your burger.

Like your burger to have a bit of pink?

Cook the bacon BEFORE adding it to the ground beef.

Alternately, use the unused bacon grease, which tastes AMAZING. You can add a little to the burger or just cook it in the fat. Learn how to collect and store it here.

Use sausages to add more fat and juice to your ground beef. And it’s super easy.

You don’t need any additional equipment to mix them together.

Remove the sausage’s skin before combining the meat and ground beef in a bowl.

If you add raw sausage to the burgers, you must ensure that they are fully cooked, just like with bacon.

Another ridiculously delicious way to give your ground beef flavor, fat, and life is to use chorizo. The chorizo oil will seep into the meat as the burgers cook. YUM.

I keep it simple when adding chorizo. If the beef is 90% lean, I recommend adding 1 part chorizo for 3 parts ground beef

Remember: cooking is an art, not a science. You can adjust the aforementioned ratio to your liking without doing any harm.

Make sure that all of your guests enjoy chorizo before choosing this option.

Without a substantial amount of cheese to accompany it, no good burger is complete.

So instead of putting cheese on top of the beef, why not incorporate it into it?

A surefire way to increase fat and oozy-juiciness—is that even a word?—is to add cheese. All without needing to add any other meats.

Here are a few of my personal favorite additions:

Blue cheese
Feta cheese
Cream cheese

Simply combine the raw ground beef with a generous amount of your favorite cheese using a hand mixer.

I advise using a cheese grater or cutting small pieces of a solid cheese if you’re using it.

Cold cheese works best for this task. Even further, I’d put the cheese in the freezer for 20 to 30 minutes before adding it to the raw beef.

Let’s not forget about butter. Butter enhances the flavor profile of ground beef without adding any other distracting flavors. Butter also adds moisture and tenderness to the beef.

And chances are, you already have some on hand.

How to add butter to ground beef

To prevent air pockets in the beef after the butter melts, dice or grate the butter into small pieces.
Before adding the butter to the beef, make sure it is very cold. To ensure that the butter and beef are at the same temperature, I advise freezing them both for about 30 minutes.
Make individual patties out of the ground beef after gently incorporating the butter pieces. Here, using a light touch is essential to avoid the ground beef becoming mushy.

Mix in a fattier mince

Although it might seem obvious, sometimes we overlook the obvious choices!

You’re not required to use a particular breed of beef.

If you have an old pack of 15% mince (pork or beef) in hanging around in your freezer, take some of this and mix it into your 5% mince to increase the fat content

If you want to significantly raise the fat levels, you can use a 50:50 ratio, or you can just add a few handfuls. It’s totally up to you.

How much fat should I add to my ground beef?

You can easily determine how much fat to add to your ground beef by using the helpful table I made.

Let’s run through a brief example to show how it functions.

You have 10% fat ground beef (90% lean) and decide you want to make burgers with 30% fat (70% lean)

The next step is to match the type of ground beef you currently have (in the columns) with the type you want (in the rows).

The percentages in the table represent how much pure fat to add to the

40% Fat	30% Fat	20% Fat
20% Fat	+25%	+13%	–
15% Fat	+29%	+18%	+6%
10% Fat	+33%	+22%	+11%
7% Fat	+35%	+25%	+14%

To turn 10% fat ground beef into 30% fat ground beef, you%E2%80%99ll need to add 22% of the total weight of your original ground beef in pure fat (e g. tallow, bacon fat, butter).

Confused? Lets go through a real life example:

If you have 2lbs of 10% fat ground beef, you%E2%80%99ll need to add 7oz (0 44lbs) of fat to make a 30% lean mix. 0. 44 lbs is 22% of 2 lbs.

Your burgers will still be delicious if you approximate if you don’t want to be that precise.

Tips for making lean ground beef juicy

Here are a few more pointers to ensure that your ground beef is as juicy and tender as possible:

Don’t overwork the meat. Overworking the beef makes it tough and lifeless. Treat it gently and you’ll be rewarded.
Cooking burgers? Just flip them ONCE. Pretty much the same logic as #1. Unless you intend to smash them, resist the urge to press the patties too hard with your spatula while cooking.
The fattier the beef, the more heat you need. In general, higher-fat cuts should be cooked on a high flame while leaner cuts should be cooked on a medium flame. Depending on how much fat you decide to add, adjust

How To Add Fat To Lean Ground Beef?