- 2 months ago
Stretch a small amount of meat into a delicious and nutritious meal using an ancient grain! In this video, Chef John shows you how to make a hearty, 10,000 year old Hamburger Helper using high-protein farro. Packed with ground beef, mushrooms, and warm spices, this simple one-pan dinner delivers incredible texture and rich flavor.
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00:00Hello, this is Chef John from Foodwishes.com with 10,000-year-old Hamburger Helper.
00:08That's right, Hamburger Helper was invented 10,000 years ago.
00:12Although they didn't use noodles or rice, they used farro, the world's first domesticated grain.
00:18And our ancient ancestors used it the same way I'm going to show you how to use it here,
00:22which is to stretch a little bit of meat into a big, beautiful, delicious, and very nutritious meal.
00:29So with that, let's go ahead and get started with the star of the show, some farro,
00:34which is a beautiful grain and easy to find.
00:37And this one was what's called pearled, meaning the grain is polished so it cooks faster.
00:42And what we'll do first is put this in a strainer and give it a nice rinse under some cold
00:47fresh water,
00:48which is going to wash off any dust and or any residual starch on the surface.
00:53And once that's been accomplished, we'll simply set that aside,
00:56and we'll head to the stove where we're going to transfer one pound of beef into a skillet
01:00containing about three tablespoons of olive oil.
01:03And we'll set our heat to high, and we'll start breaking that meat up.
01:07And at this point, we can also add our salt.
01:09And I'm going to do a teaspoon for the meat, plus another teaspoon for the rest of the ingredients.
01:14And of course, we will taste it later and adjust if need be.
01:18And what we'll do is break our meat up into nice small crumbles before we add our mushrooms.
01:23All right, I guess we could add the beef and mushrooms to the pan at the same time.
01:26But I think it's a lot easier to crumble our meat uniformly without all those little pieces of mushroom in
01:31the way.
01:32So once we have our meat broken down and starting to brown, we'll go ahead and toss those in.
01:38And what I did is cut the mushrooms in half, and then slice them across nice and thick.
01:42And we will stir those in and continue to saute until everything's nicely browned,
01:47which doesn't happen right away.
01:49Right, the mushrooms always exude a lot of moisture.
01:52But once that evaporates and the pan dries out,
01:55the mushrooms and the beef should start to take on some nice color.
01:58And take your time with this step.
02:00Since the browner things get, the deeper the flavor will be.
02:04So I really do think you want to go at least this far.
02:07And once we're happy with how things are looking,
02:10we will add our celery and onions.
02:11And we'll reduce our heat down a little bit to medium high.
02:15Oh, and I didn't this time.
02:16But if you have some peppers you want to dice up and throw in,
02:19that would be good in this as well.
02:21Either way, we'll cook this during for a couple minutes.
02:24Until, yes, you guessed it.
02:26Our onions soften and start to turn translucent.
02:29And once that happens, we can go ahead and add our spices and herbs,
02:33which for me is going to be some freshly ground black pepper,
02:36a little touch of cumin,
02:38some smoked paprika,
02:40plus a little bit of dried oregano.
02:42And we'll stir those in and cook that for another minute or so.
02:45You know, just to wake those seasonings up.
02:48Oh, and as I've taught you before,
02:50whenever you're stirring something in a pan,
02:52don't just space out.
02:53Try to remember what you might have forgot,
02:55which for me in this case was the garlic powder,
02:58which was hiding behind my beef broth.
03:00So I went ahead and stirred that in.
03:02And once we've cooked all that for a minute or two,
03:05we will add a couple tablespoons of tomato paste
03:07before we add our farro.
03:09And by the way, if you're still buying tomato paste in cans,
03:12we gotta have a talk.
03:14All right, it comes in tubes now,
03:15which is so much easier to use.
03:17But anyway, we'll stir that in
03:19and cook that for a minute or two.
03:21And even though it's not a lot,
03:23that's going to add a nice little touch of acidity,
03:25plus give our final product a much more gorgeous color.
03:29And that's it.
03:30We can go ahead and stir in our rinse farro.
03:32And we'll give it a stir,
03:33since I like to have it coated
03:35with that flavorful fat in the pan
03:36before we pour in our broth.
03:38And once that's been accomplished,
03:40we'll do just that.
03:41And I'm using a nice rich beef broth for this,
03:44but a chicken broth would also work great.
03:47Or if times are tough,
03:48you can just use water.
03:49And this will still be very tasty.
03:52And once we stir that in,
03:53we'll raise our heat to high,
03:55and we'll wait for this to start to boil.
03:57And while we're doing this,
03:59we're going to want to scrape the bottom of the pan
04:00to make sure it releases any of that caramelized-down goodness.
04:04And once this does come back to a boil,
04:06we're going to give it one last stir,
04:08and we're going to cover it
04:09and reduce our heat to medium-low.
04:11And we're going to cook this anywhere
04:13between 10 minutes and 40 minutes,
04:15depending on the brand
04:17and how much it's been pearled.
04:18All right, I'm using a quick-cooking 10-minute variety
04:21that you can find at Whole Foods or Trader Joe's.
04:24So you're going to have to check
04:25to see how long yours says to cook.
04:28But in any event,
04:29we're simply going to cook it
04:30until it's as tender as we like.
04:32And if you are using one of the longer cooking varieties,
04:35feel free to check it once in a while
04:37and give it a stir
04:38and possibly add more liquid if you think it needs it.
04:41But anyway, I went ahead and checked mine after 10 minutes,
04:44and I'm going to go ahead and give it a stir
04:45and then a taste
04:46so I can check for doneness.
04:48And properly cooked farro is tender,
04:50but it's not soft.
04:52It should be nice and twosome,
04:54similar to al dente pasta.
04:56Right, some people describe the texture as chewy,
04:58which I'm not crazy about
04:59since it sounds like you have to keep chewing it
05:01to break it down,
05:02which is not the case.
05:04But it is a little bit springy to the bite,
05:06which is one reason it's so pleasurable
05:08and addictive to eat.
05:09But anyway, after testing mine,
05:11I decided it was 95% of the way cooked,
05:13which is exactly what we want at this stage,
05:16since we are going to turn off the heat
05:17and cover it and let it rest.
05:19So I cranked the heat up
05:20just for a few more seconds,
05:22just so it was simmering enthusiastically again.
05:24And then I covered it and turned off the heat.
05:27And I let it rest for seven minutes,
05:29which I thought would be perfect.
05:30And it was.
05:31And I know it looks like all the liquid's been absorbed
05:34and it's gone,
05:35but it's not.
05:36And you'll see that
05:37when I stir in the last two ingredients,
05:39which for me are some freshly snipped chives,
05:41plus a nice handful of cheddar cheese.
05:44Since when I do Hamburger Helper,
05:46I always go for the cheesy varieties.
05:49And that's it.
05:49We'll go ahead and stir that in.
05:51And as you can see,
05:53that's still nice and juicy.
05:55Although as it sits and cools off for a few minutes,
05:57it is going to tighten up a little more.
06:00And then you know the drill.
06:01After we have that all mixed together,
06:03we'll give it a taste for seasoning
06:04and maybe adjust with more salt if we need it.
06:07But that was tasting perfect to me.
06:09So I went ahead and served up
06:11and garnished very simply with some more chives.
06:14And then I grabbed a big old spoon and served up.
06:17And while the spices and seasonings
06:19would have been different 10,000 years ago,
06:21and this would have been made with goat
06:22or sheep or wild boar,
06:24the finished dish probably looked very similar.
06:27And they would have been every bit as excited
06:29to eat this as I was,
06:31which I'm going to do with a little more chive.
06:33And a slice of sourdough,
06:34taking full advantage of modern bread-making technology.
06:39And that, my friends, is about as good
06:41and comforting and nutritious and delicious
06:43as a bowl of food can be.
06:45All right, there's a very old saying I just made up
06:47that says,
06:48nobody ever eats farro just once.
06:50Okay, you either eat it zero times
06:52because you've never tried it,
06:53or you make it,
06:55and you realize how awesome it is,
06:56and it goes into the regular rotation.
06:59And we talked about the texture,
07:01which again is so interesting.
07:03It's sort of a cross between a very large grain of rice
07:05and a very small, perfectly cooked piece of pasta.
07:08But if you're wondering about the flavor,
07:10it's actually very mild
07:11and has a very subtle sort of earthy nuttiness,
07:14although really nothing very pronounced.
07:17And this really is a very versatile dish.
07:19All right, there's lots of ways
07:20you could season this differently
07:22and add different kinds of vegetables
07:23and try it with different meats.
07:25So once you discover the magic of farro,
07:28I really hope you experiment
07:29with some different versions.
07:30I mean, you are after all the Neolithic chief
07:32of trying this with something
07:34besides mushrooms and ground beef.
07:36But no matter what kind of farro you use
07:38or what you put in yours,
07:40there's a reason humans have been enjoying this
07:42for over 10,000 years.
07:43And I really do hope you give it a try soon.
07:47So please follow the links below
07:49for the ingredient amounts,
07:50a printable written recipe,
07:52and much more info as usual.
07:54And as always, enjoy.