This surprisingly simple dish of curried ground beef or lamb is full of complex flavor and is a great favorite. Keema (or kheema) matar is a lovely Indian beef or lamb curried dish made with minced or ground meat, curry spices, and peas or potatoes.
My mother-in-law was the master of easy beef and rice dishes (like this Lemon-y Greek Beef and Rice dish) because she often bought a quarter of a grassfed cow all in ground beef for her freezer. Many of these dishes became great favorites of the family, including ours!
I had forgotten about this delicious recipe until I was talking to my sister in law about freezer meals for after our baby was born. She mentioned that this froze well, and was her favorite freezer meal postpartum (she had a baby not that long ago).
I promptly got the recipe from my SIL and ran to the store for the simple ingredients, and made up a quadruple batch! Three batches for our freezer and one for dinner. How could I have forgotten about this delicious recipe?! We devoured it.
While I haven’t been able to stock up my freezer as much as I’d like, I do have a nice little stash set aside (including these freezer meatballs). Perhaps if the baby gives me another week or two, I’ll manage a couple more as well.
Meanwhile, here is this delicious recipe! I’ll note the slight adjustments I made. Serve this with basmati rice, or cauliflower rice for a grain-free version. Naan bread is always a welcome addition as well.
Other Easy and Healthy Recipes you may like:
Easy Paleo Mini Meatloaves
Mexican Beef Bowls
Ground Beef and Cabbage
Cuban Picadillo Lettuce Wraps
Crockpot Chicken Teriyaki
Easiest Teriyaki Chicken Ever
14 Easy Dinner Recipes
Easy Egg Muffins with Ham and Pesto
- 2 teaspoons fat or oil of choice
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely minced of put through a garlic press
- 1 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and grated
- 4 green chili peppers, finely chopped (You can cut down on the chili peppers if you don't want it very spicy - I did because spicy food gets more spicy when frozen. Anaheim is a mild green chili you may like. ).
- 2 tablespoons curry powder
- 1 pound ground beef or lamb (sometimes we do a mix of the both)
- 1 cup frozen peas
- Unrefined salt
- Juice from 1 lemon (optional)
- In a large saucepan over medium-high heat (use medium is using cast iron), heat the oil or fat of choice until hot. Add the onions, garlic, ginger and chili peppers. Sprinkle generously with salt. Cook, stirring as needed, until the onions are softened.
- Add the spices, and mix quickly into the onions, then add the ground meat. Stir thoroughly, and then stir as needed while the meat cooks. For a melded flavor, you can cover and simmer for 15-30 minutes at this point. (Just make sure that your meat doesn't dry out if using low-fat meat and skip if freezing). Right before serving, add peas, lemon juice, and salt to taste. If freezing, freeze before you add the peas.
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Kimi! You keep making me SO hungry! I need to go buy some ground beef because I ran out… It make me think of an Israeli inspired dish I like to make.
This is perfect for February…. We have a three week old baby, our fourth, and are living with my parents as we are in the midst of moving to a farm & our house is not yet ready. So, of freezer meals we have none, yet this is so simple that I am going to make some this week. Thank you for the idea! You will certainly be glad to have some of these things in you freezer!
I am a loyal follower of your blog and love hearing about your sweet family & your kitchen. You have certainly blessed both of ours. We’ll be praying for you & you family as you wait for your dear little one.
I make the same thing but add a few tablespoons of sweet and sour sauce that has an apricot base makes it sweet and savory and the texture is very satisfying.
This recipe looks amazing. I’m definitely going to have to try it.
Yay! My kids ate this! We have lots of ground in the freezer so I was excited to try this recipe. I’d also like to start incorporating more spices into my cooking, especially curry-type ones. My oldest needed coaxing, but eventually ate all her plate, my second ate it up right away and my youngest at 3 years old, needed more than a little coaxing, but he still ate it by the end! My husband ate it no problem, but he usually eats anything I make anyways! I used ground beef, and one poblano pepper. I also used a can of peas instead of frozen and I forgot a lemon but I had lime on hand and it was fine. Great dish and I’m happy to add it to my repertoire! Good luck with your coming baby!
What a wonderful dish, seriously good. This will be part of our regular meal rotation.
We also buy part of a cow and always get way too much ground beef, it was great to use some up in this quick-to-table dish.
My friends and I often ate at the Taj Mahal Indian Curry restaurant in Sapporo, Japan, we loved all the various curry dishes, but they were not dry, they were curries served in a sauce. I would like to learn how to make those dishes. In the restaurant the curry was served with rice and nan.