Learn to Make Keto Foods: Steaks & Burgers

One of the reasons our way of eating is often described as a ‘luxurious’ diet is that we can have steaks— really nice ones— and not have to have half portions or quarter portions because we are counting carbs and not calories and all steak is zero carb. 

Burgers are also good food, especially if you can get some grass-fed ground beef from Walmart. It’s weird to eat them with a knife and fork, on a plate, instead of on those overly-sweet buns the fast-food places are pushing, but it’s a learning curve. 

A lot of people who can’t cook anything else know how to take a steak and a frying pan and make dinner. But some of us have trouble with it. I never knew how long to cook things for, and so either got nearly raw or overcooked steaks. 

What helped me was when I got my George Foreman grill (the one with the interchangeable plates) and the booklet came with suggested times for cooking a lot of kinds of meat. Beef ribeye steak is 5-7 minutes on high, hamburgers are 3-5 minutes on medium, and pork loin chops are 4-5 minutes on medium.

I figured out that since the GF grill heats from top and bottom at once, if I was cooking the meat in a frying pan, I would take the suggested number of minutes and do that number of minutes, flip, and do the same number of minutes on the other side. I would set a timer.  That way, if the meat came out too rare, I could add a minute next time I cooked that kind of meat, Or if it was not rare enough, I could subtract a minute. All to my taste.

To learn more meat-cooking lore, you can check with cookbooks, especially low-carb cookbooks, or do internet searches. That’s how I learned to cook chicken hearts— I found a few blog entries about cooking chicken hearts and I used it when I cooked my own.

Seasoning meat: Mostly you will want to add salt (or salt-free Spike or kelp powder) and pepper to your meat before cooking. Perhaps some onion powder or garlic powder as well, or paprika. Soy sauce or Worchestershire sauce can also be used. In time you may learn to put meat in marinades before cooking. A simple low-carb vinaigrette dressing can do for a marinade. Put a couple Tablespoons of the marinade in a plastic bag with the meat and keep it in the fridge a couple of hours. People also use seasonings at the table. Low-carb catsup or low-carb barbecue sauce can be made at home and are good for this purpose. 

Frozen meat: I freeze meat. I live alone, I buy ‘family packs’ of meat to save money, and I pack it all up into my big freezer on the porch. But you have to thaw the meat before you cook it! In the evening, pull out any frozen meat you need to cook the next day and let it thaw in the fridge. NOTE: I normally freeze single portions. If you have a whole turkey in your freezer it will need longer to thaw out!

Recipe: Chilli Chicken & Veggies

Yes! You can turn canned chicken and canned stir-fry or chop suey veggies into an easy ‘chicken-noodle’ dish! An easy meal for those having hard times.  This recipe is inspired by the ‘Chilli Chicken’ recipe in Dr. Paramesh Shamanna’s ‘Indian Low Carb Recipes,’ but it is much simpler and uses canned chicken.

The Chicken

Drain one can 9.75 oz. (276 g.) can of chunk chicken breast and put the pieces on a plate. Sprinkle with:

salt

pepper

onion powder

garlic powder

chili powder

ground ginger

garam masala (optional)

ajman seed (carom seed, ajwain seed— optional)

Sprinkle each spice to taste— if you don’t like too much chili powder or can’t get enough garlic, sprinkle the amount YOU would like. Put chicken and spices into a plastic bag or glass jar. Add 1-2 Tablespoons (15 ml) of soy sauce. Keep chicken in this marinade about 1-2 hours. This amount of chicken is good for 1-2 servings, depending on appetite. 

The Veggies

Drain one 28 oz can of chop suey or stir fry vegetables and divide into 3 portions of about 1 cup each. Sprinkle veggies with a bit of salt and pepper, garlic powder, garam masala and ajman seed, and put each portion in a bag or small jar with some soy sauce. You only need 1 portion of veggies for each serving. 

Cooking

You may stir-fry the meat and veggies in a wok or frying pan. Use ghee, avocado oil, or EVOO as your stir-frying oil. You can add a bit of toasted sesame seeds to it, or a Tablespoon or so of pecan or walnut pieces. (Yes, you can stir-fry pecan or walnut pieces.)

Or, you can cook them on a George Foreman grill using a Baking Plate for the bottom plate— preheat to Medium, with ghee, avocado oil or EVOO on the grill, and add meat and veggies when preheating is done. Cook for about 6-7 minutes. 

Variations:

You can use any leftover cooked chicken or other meat in about the right amount. You can also use home-sprouted mung beans, zucchini ‘noodles,’ cabbage ‘pasta’ or other veggies. If you use frozen veggies, thaw your portion before cooking— perhaps overnight.

You can replace the onion powder and garlic powder and chili powder with fresh onions, garlic and hot peppers in whatever amount you enjoy. 

You can also change up the spices to whatever you happen to prefer. If you are on salt restriction, you can use salt-free Spike, or up some of the spices so the dish doesn’t seem so bland without salt.

Healthy Holy Week greetings from

Nissa Annakindt

"Roasted" Garlic in a George Foreman grill

Finished Garlic in Storage Jar

Garlic is great for both culinary and medicinal purposes. I was using Kyolic Garlic capsules for my high blood pressure, and recently ran out of the pills and couldn’t afford more. So I just ate some of the “roasted” garlic I had on hand. It’s not as unpleasant as eating garlic cloves raw, in fact they are fine-tasting. And I think they are working for my blood pressure. (I also take 2 drugs for my blood pressure, but the garlic must have been helping because my readings went up when I ran out of the Kyolic Garlic.)

“Roasted” Garlic in a George Foreman contact grill

Step one: break your heads of garlic into individual cloves of garlic. Leave the papery stuff on the garlic cloves. Cut a bit off each garlic clove at the base or bottom (in the direction of the roots, not the top.)  Put the cloves in a plastic ziplock bag or a glass canning jar. Measure out 1/4 cup of EVOO (extra-virgin olive oil.) You CAN add 1 tsp (teaspoon) of kelp or basil or oregano or thyme— or two or three of the above— if you want to flavor your garlic cloves, but this is optional. Marinate for a while or overnight.

Garlic, marinating

Step two: Prepare your George Foreman grill by setting the positioning lever to the back, or level, position. Put a Baking Plate on the bottom and the Steak Plate on the top. Spray some olive oil cooking spray on to the plates, and add a bit of EVOO to the Baking Plate. 

Set the temperature to Medium and preheat the grill. When the green light goes out, indicating it is preheated, put the marinated garlic cloves onto the grill in a single layer, and grill for 7 to 9 minutes (set a timer!)

Step three: When the time is up, remove your garlic cloves from the grill and place into a glass canning jar. Put a label with the contents and date on the jar. You may store the roasted garlic briefly in the refrigerator or for a few months in the freezer. 

To use: pop the garlic out of the papery ‘shell.’ You may place it in a garlic crusher to get crushed roasted garlic for culinary use. For medicinal use, I take one largish clove three times a day. Chew it well— garlic needs to be crushed or chewed to have a medicinal effect or even a culinary flavoring effect.

Just "roasted' garlic

Recipe: Ground Bison (Venison?) Patties with Cream Cheese

Ground bison? No, ground GRASS-FED bison. And I bought it at the Walmart in Marinette, Wisconsin. It comes in 1 pound packages like the grass-fed ground beef. Ground bison is leaner, though, and super-lean meat is not part of the Keto * Low-Carb way of life. So I concocted this recipe, based mainly on some old German meatball recipe I only half remember. But it turned out good. I would also try this recipe on ground venison if I had any (I have some frozen venison I might thaw and make into ground meat in my Vita-Mix) or ground turkey or ultra-lean ground beef or anything else that might bring your daily fat total too low.

INGREDIENTS:

1 pound ground bison (or ground venison, or other ground meat) [0 grams carbs, 0 fiber, 0 net carbs]

4 oz. cream cheese (Philadelphia or similar) [4 g carbs, 0 g fiber, 4 g net carbs]

1 egg (I used a jumbo egg) {0.4 g carbs, 0 g fiber, 0.4 g net carbs]

2 TBSP (tablespoon) ground flaxseed meal [4.04 g carbs, 3.8 g fiber, 0.24 g net carbs]

DIRECTIONS:

Put on disposable plastic gloves, and smoosh the ingredients around in a small bowl until mixed. Divide meat into four equal portions and form into patties. Cook the patties just as you normally cook hamburger patties, or put them into individual freezer bags to freeze them (I used 1 pint freezer bags.) These make nice-sized patties, if they come out too big for your tastes, divide the recipe into 5 portions. OPTIONAL: place 2 TBSP of home-made vinaigrette dressing in the bag and marinate for a few hours or overnight. I used the Italian Vinaigrette recipe from 500 Low-Carb recipes by Dana Carpender— it has garlic in it. Garlic is life!

NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION

Whole Recipe: 8.44 g carbs, 3.8g fiber, 4.64g net carbs

1/4 recipe— 1 patty: 2.11g carbs, 0.95g fiber, 1.16g net carbs

GEORGE FOREMAN GRILL INSTRUCTIONS

If your patties are frozen, thaw them overnight. Use the level (not slanted) setting and use the Baking Pan on the bottom and the Steak Plate on top. Spray with olive oil pan spray and set grill to Medium and preheat. When grill is heated, cook patty for 5 minutes. One instruction booklet I have for my grill gives Medium as the heat setting for burgers, the other instruction booklet FOR THE SAME GRILL says ‘High.’ Both say 3-5 minutes. Ground turkey, on the other hand, is 8-9 minutes on High. 

I had some grilled mushrooms in the fridge and set them on the grill with the meat patty to heat them— they came out maybe a bit overdone but I liked it okay as a burger topping. You may also add low-carb catsup and any other burger toppings you really like. DON’T eat it on a bun or bread, but with a knife and fork. (My flatbread recipe is too fragile to serve as a burger bun— maybe if you made them with 3 TBSP batter instead of 2? That would equal 1/4 cup, by the way.)

If you have a cheaper model of George Foreman grill or contact grill (cooks from both sides), use a tile or something to make the grill more level. If there are no replaceable plates, of course you can’t use the Baking Pan. If any significant amount of fat escapes into the Drip Tray (fat-catching tray), top the burger with it or part of it when cooking is done. 

If you have any comments or ideas about this recipe, please drop a comment. If you make this recipe, stop back here and tell me how it turned out. I love to hear from  blog readers! Well, not so much spam comments or mean trolls, (unless they are funny) but everyone else.

Using a George Foreman grill on Keto * Low-Carb

Let’s face it: the George Foreman table-top grill is pushing a dietary approach that is the opposite of ours: reduce fat, reduce fat, reduce fat, and ignore the harm done by carbs. But I love my George Foreman grill and use it often— to make low-carb, high-fat food!

MY GEORGE FOREMAN GRILL

There are different models of George Foreman grill. Mine is called ‘The Next Grilleration G5’ and has removable grilling plates. It also has a lever so you can change the position of the grill from tilted (so the fat drains off) to level (to keep the healthy fat you paid money for.)

It has a top plate called the Steak Plate and a bottom plate called the Grilling Plate. But you can also use a different plate called the Baking Pan to cook steaks, chops and the like without draining off the fat. Keep the Plate Position Lock Lever in the back position. 

I DIDN’T KNOW HOW TO COOK MEAT

I could do a lot of cooking things— from making cookies to baking bread— but I never learned to cook steaks or chops or any kind of meat before I got my George Foreman grill. The grill’s instructions has a list of the kinds of meat, poultry, fish and other foods it can cook, the temperature (high, medium, low), and the number of minutes to cook. I always set the timer for this, so I don’t under- or overcook.  The grill cooks on both sides at the same time, so it cooks more quickly. The food is tasty, as well. 

I also use the instruction booklet when I am cooking steaks or chops in a frying pan— I use the time indicated as the time to cook on each side. 

ADDING FAT

When you are using the Baking Pan for the bottom plate, you can use avocado oil or other healthy oil on the plate to keep food from sticking and to add fat. Also you can use a fat-containing sauce or add a bit of sour cream to the finished food. 

RIBEYE STEAKS

I got some decent ribeye steaks and I marinaded it in a plastic bag with low-carb vinaigrette dressing (from 500 Low-Carb Recipes by Dana Carpender.) I cooked them on the grill, set to High, with the Baking Pan and the Plate Position Lock Lever  in the back position. I used EVOO (extra-virgin olive oil) on the grill to prevent sticking and add fat. It turned out really tasty.  I intend to cook some boneless pork chops in the same way (except the booklet recommends the Medium setting and a shorter cooking time.)

BACON

I like my bacon crisp. Not quite as crisp as my mom does, who tends to like hers a bit cremated, but still…. Bacon cooked in a pan in its own fat isn’t quick to get crisp, so I use the grill with the Grilling Plate and with the Plate Position Lock Lever to the front position and a clean drip tray in place. 

After cooking the bacon, I pour the hot or warm fat through a coffee filter into a canning jar and save the fat for various cooking uses. I’ve even made mayonnaise with bacon fat!

GRILLED ONIONS

A yellow or white onion of 2.5 inch diameter is 10 grams of carbs and 2 grams of fiber, so plan your portions accordingly. I slice mine about 1/4 inch thick, sprinkle it with Himalayan pink salt and/or Spike or Vegesal, Use the Baking Plate and the Plate Position Lock Lever set to the back position, and use EVOO or other healthy fat on the plate. Cook for the recommended time of 2-3 minutes on High, or go as much as 4 minutes. I used to be a big eater of onion rings, mainly because of the high carb batter, but I like these plain grilled onions very well. 

CHICKEN THIGHS

I used bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs, and actually cooked it 2 minutes beyond the 7 minutes recommended, and it still was a bit under-done. I ate it with a tablespoon of low-carb Hoisin Sauce (recipe from 500 Low-Carb Recipes by Dana Carpender.) Heavenly, and the bone went in the freezer bag for chicken bones, to become part of some chicken bone broth some day. 

I did some searching online about cooking bone-in chicken, and the only useful suggestion I read was to beat the chicken thigh down a bit with a meat mallet. I don’t own a meat mallet, but will cover a heavy aluminum ice crusher in a plastic bag and smash the chicken with that next time.

CLEAN UP

The grill needs to be unplugged and cool down before you remove the removable plates for washing. Sadly, these plates have to be washed by hand. I use my biggest dishwashing pan and fill it with soapy water. I use the gentle sponge that came with the grill— never use scouring pads on the non-stick finish. I understand, from doing some research, that the dishwasher-safe plates meant for a newer model also fit my current grill. When I get a working dishwasher in the house, the new plates are a planned purchase.

The base of the grill must never be immersed in water. Wipe it with a soft cloth or sponge, and dry with a dry cloth. 

If you hate kitchen clean-up as much as I do, get in the habit of cleaning your grill promptly instead of letting it sit there dirty, getting harder to clean. 

Do you have a George Foreman or similar indoor grill? Have you used it for Keto * Low-Carb cooking yet? What have you cooked on it so far?