This ground beef and rice skillet combines taco seasoned ground beef with black beans, golden corn, cilantro lime diced tomatoes, and two types of rice to create a massive dish with tons of flavor. Thanks to using half “real” rice and half cauliflower rice, you get a huge bang for your buck in terms of calories per serving. Each massive 300-gram serving has 27 grams of protein with just 36 grams of carbs and 335 calories!
If you’re a fan of my infamous creamy taco soup, I think you’ll dig this recipe!
Ground Beef and Rice Skillet Recipe Walkthrough
Unlike the taco soup, this recipe uses a homemade taco seasoning in place of taco seasoning packets. If you’d like to use the latter to save time, you’re more than welcome. There’s no chef shaming around here!
As for the ground beef seasoning, I used the blend of spices from my baked beef tacos.
- paprika
- ground chipotle peppers (or chili powder)
- garlic powder
- cumin
- salt and black pepper
Cooking the Ground Beef
Like I ranted about in my sweet chili ground beef and brussels sprouts recipe, I think adding spices to the exterior of ground beef before going in the skillet allows the spices to bloom and develop a crust on the beef. This creates a ton of flavor but if you wanted to throw the beef in and add the spices as it cooks, it’ll still turn out fine.
One difference between this ground beef and rice skillet and the brussels skillet I mentioned above is the exclusion of oil here. I wanted to keep the fat under control but if you’d like to add a tablespoon of oil to the skillet before cooking the beef, that will only add about 20 calories per serving.
Adding the Beans, Corn, and Tomatoes to the Cooked Ground Beef
If you skip the oil and have some sticking on the bottom of your skillet, that’s okay. The juices from this trio will allow you to deglaze the skillet (scrape all the crispy bits from the bottom).
You’ll want to cook this for a good 8-10 minutes or until there’s very little liquid remaining. If you’re having trouble reducing the mixture, increase the heat and give it a few extra minutes.
Worst case, you end up with soup, and I guess that’s not all that bad.
Adding the Rice, Cheese, and Finishing in the Oven
The recipe calls for cauliflower rice and a packet of ready rice. You’re more than welcome to use all cauliflower rice or all “real” rice. You will, however, want to use a rice that’s cooked since we’re adding it in at the end. If you throw instant rice in at the end, you’ll have some crunchy rice!
If you wanted to use something like instant rice, you could probably add it in the step with the corn, black beans, and diced tomatoes. I haven’t tested it, but I imagine the rice would cook enough in the juices.
You could also use other grains like the quinoa in my Mexican beef and quinoa skillet or chopped tortillas like in my Tex Mex ground chicken casserole.
After your stir everything together, top with shredded cheese and pop the skillet in the oven to melt everything together. It’s serving time!
The recipe card below suggests fat free Greek yogurt and hot sauce, but you could definitely spice things up with my creamy jalapeño dip, avocado salsa, or the lime vinaigrette and spicy crema from my Tex Mex ground beef and shaved brussels sprouts recipe.
And speaking of Tex Mex, you could always throw this ground beef and rice in a tortilla and make something like my cheesy black bean quesadillas.
That about covers it. If you have any other questions about this ground beef and rice skillet, drop a comment below.
Tex-Mex Ground Beef and Rice Skillet
Ingredients
For the Seasoned Ground Beef*
- 1 lb Ground Beef, 96/4
- 1 Tbsp Paprika
- 2 tsp Ground Chipotle Peppers, or chili powder
- 1 tsp Cumin
- 1 tsp Garlic Powder
- 1/2 tsp Black Pepper
- 1/2 tsp Kosher Salt
Add to the Cooked Ground Beef
- 15 oz can Black Beans
- 15 oz can Whole Kernel Corn
- 10 oz can Mexican RO-TEL, diced tomatoes with green chiles
- 12 oz bag Frozen Cauliflower Rice**
- 9 oz packet Uncle Ben’s Ready Rice Original
- 3/4 C 84g Shredded Colby Jack Cheese
Instructions
- Preheat an oven to 400F and microwave both bags of rice. Set aside.
- Heat a large 12" skillet over medium-high heat.
- Mix the spices for the ground beef in a small bowl. Coat both sides of the ground beef with the spices, gently pressing the spices into the surface. Add the ground beef to the skillet and cook for 1-2 minutes on the first side before flipping, crumbling, and cooking another 4-5 minutes until no pink remains.
- Add the corn, beans, and RO-TEL to the skillet (all undrained) and stir. Cook for 8-10 minutes until very little liquid remains in the skillet.
- Add both packets of rice to the skillet, stirring to fully incorporate. Top with the shredded cheese and bake for about 5 minutes to fully melt the cheese. Serve with freshly chopped cilantro, fat free Greek yogurt, hot sauce, or your desired toppings.
Who doesn’t love a one pot recipe?! This one hit the spot and will be on our monthly rotation list. Very filling with the added cauliflower rice. Yum!!
This is one of Mason’s recipes that is a go to for my weekly prep.
It’s easy and always turns out amazing. Heats up nice and is even better as leftovers. Kid approved, my five year old and 2 year old love it.
Another weekly dinner for us! I use instant white rice in this, no cauliflower rice mixed in. Like Mason mentions, I add this when I add the beans, corn, and tomatoes. I have to add a bit of water to help the rice cook, but it turns out amazing every time. One of my absolute favorite meals. We top with guacamole salsa for some added “umph!”
This has become one of my staple meals. It’s so easy and quick to throw together on a week night! You get some veggies in and it’s so filling and makes plenty for leftovers! Love it.
Such an easy volume meal. I loved that it didn’t take long to make. I did the lazy way and used taco seasoning and decided to go all cauliflower rice on mine to keep the carbs down. Turned out better than expected. You’d never know it was cauliflower rice you were eating. Also ran into the same issue as other where the liquid did not reduce. I ended up just adding the cauliflower rice in and found that it helped soak up any remaining juices at that point.
I love to prep this for the whole week for lunch. It’s just as good reheated in the microwave as it is made fresh for dinner!!
This recipe was simple and delicious! It was perfect to cook for dinner and have leftovers for lunch the next day! Topped with sour cream and jalapeños made it even better! 10/10
This is easily one of my favorite recipes. Lots of flavor and very high volume so it keeps me full for a long time.
I’ve made this 3 times so far. The first time as is and it was amazing! Second time I did try just cauliflower rice and it was still amazing (I thought there wouldn’t be as much texture but it was still so good!). The third time was Taco night at my house and it was great! So easy to make, so much food. And just set up the various taco fixings and people made tacos; bowls or burritos! Easy one Pan meal!
I make this with ground turkey then roll up in a lavash wrap with a handful of spinach and cheese. Huge, tasty burrito with great macros.