An Ultimate Guide On Grinding Cooked Meat In Food Processor

Many people have a hobby of grinding meat at home because they can guarantee freshness compared to beef bought at the butcher or the store. Another health benefit is that ground meat reduces the risk of E.coli infections.

With such advantages, raw meat grinding has become popular and is a favorite cooking process for many people.

How about cooked meat? Can you grind leftover cooked meat? Yes, it’s possible, even though it sounds a bit strange. Use your best food processor and follow these steps:

• Cut the meat into cubes.
• Partially freeze the meat cubes and the blade of the food processor.
• Grind cooked meat.
• If needed, re-grind.
• Use or store the ground meat.

To learn more about specific meat grinding steps as well as we in-depth analysis, read this article. Let’s start.

Grinding Cooked Meat In Food Processor: Step-by-Step Guides

Grinding your own meat has many health benefits, so we recommend trying it out at home. For those who don’t have a meat grinder, use a food processor as an alternative.

View more: Top meat grinder reviews

Here is a step-by-step guide to how you can grind meat in a food processor.

Cut the meat into square cubes

#1. Cut the cooked meat into cubes

Before putting meat in the food processor, you must cut and divide the meat into small pieces. Remove bone and parts of tendons or fascia. Keep the fat part of creating the flavor for the dish.

Cut the meat into 1-inch squares.

#2. Freeze the meat cubes and food processor blade partially

Line a baking sheet with parchment and lay the meat, spreading it out in a single layer. If the meat does not fit into a single layer, use two sheets. Place the meat and food processor blade in the freezer compartment.

Keep meat frozen for 20 to 30 minutes. You need to check until the edges and corners of the flesh are just firm. Don’t let the beef freeze completely. Keep the center soft.

#3. Grind meat in the food processor

Place the chilled food blade in the food processor. Put the meat cubes in the blender, taking care to only use half the amount of meat. If there are too many meat cubes, put them in the freezer until use. Close the lid and grind the meat 8 to 10 times in one-second pulses. When finished, the meat is coarse and sticky.

Related: Meat grinder vs food processor

With ground chicken or turkey, you need to be aware that the result will be much drier because there is not much fat in the meat. If you are going to grind cooked meat, use darker meat like ground beef. You can also use cooked chicken in recipes with lots of sauces to reduce the dryness of the lean meat.

You should choose fatty fish, like tuna or salmon, to grind fish.

For a more intuitive view, check out this video.

#4. Grind again, if needed

Pour the ground meat onto the baking sheet. Use your fingers to quickly sift through the flesh and pick out large chunks of meat that the blade missed. Put them back into the processor and continue blending.

Ground cooked meat

#5. Eat or freeze the ground cooked meat

So you have finished grinding meat with a food processor. Usually, we recommend that you only grind as much meat as you need for a meal. If you want to save or freeze recipes for later, store them carefully.

View more: Meat grinder recipes

One storage trick is to shape the cuts of meat into chunks or pieces for easy storage and future use.

Other Tools For Grinding Cooked Meat

Except for food processors, you can use many different types of tools to grind chicken or beef. Other popular appliances include blenders, electric and manual meat grinders. Any food grinder can get the job done, but expect some limitations as their primary purpose is to grind raw meat.

With a meat grinder, you will have more variety in the texture of the ground meat. Use different types of plates to create coarsely or finely ground meat to your liking.

The pulse function of the blender and food processor can also create coarsely or finely ground meat to your liking. However, it will be more difficult and laborious to watch and adjust after each grind.

You can even pound cooked meat by hand. Many people think that this is much simpler and easier to apply to recipes than using the equipment. All you need is a broad and sharp butcher knife. Depending on your wishes, the hashing time is adjustable.

A stone grinder is also the perfect tool you can use to grind cooked meat.

A food processor

Pros And Cons Of Using Food Processor For Grinding Cooked Meat

Suppose you are still hesitating about whether or not to grind cooked meat; read on. We will break down for you the pros and cons of grinding cooked meat.

Advantages

The benefits of grinding cooked meat are:

• You will control the density or concentration of the patties with a more fine paste. It offers excellent flexibility to apply to a variety of recipes according to your wishes.
• Reusing meat dishes like beef cubes or chicken breast helps to avoid food waste. You can use it in soups, sandwiches, or other mixed dishes.
• Grinding the cooked meat allows the meat and spices to mix more evenly. The flavor and taste of the dish will be better because it touches the fibers more.
• When you grind your own meat, you will save two amounts of money. A sum to pay the butchers who prepared the meat and the store that sold them.

Disadvantages

The disadvantages of grinding cooked meat include:

• Meat that is shredded and pureed has undoubtedly lost a lot of nutrients.
• If you don’t control the intensity or texture, the ground meat can become too mushy and unusable in recipes.
• The meat after grinding may become tasteless.
• Some grinding devices, such as the meat grinder, are often used for raw and fresh meat. So, you will have a little difficulty when you want to mince cooked meat.
• It will take a long time to cut the meat into small pieces before grinding.
• Grinding cooked meat sometimes puts a lot of pressure on your blades and grinding plates. They may fail earlier than expected.
• It will be pretty challenging to get the meat out of the blender.

Final Thoughts

Processing and storing ground meat is an excellent way to ensure food hygiene and safety and save a lot of money for you. You must watch and study the instructions carefully to avoid making unnecessary mistakes.

There are many devices that you can take advantage of to grind meat. Meatgrinderguides.com suggests the most effortless appliances to use are the food processor and cooked meat grinder. We also recommend you grind red meat instead of white meat because it contains more fat and will give a better texture.

Good luck with our guide this time. Thank you for reading!