Korean Beef Bowl
by Chungah
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Tastes like Korean BBQ (bulgogi) and is on your dinner table in 15 min start to finish! Doesn’t get any easier than this!
Featured Comment
Please welcome our favorited Korean beef bowls, one of our most popular recipes on Damn Delicious. This recipe is a special twist on the traditional Korean dish, bulgogi, but as a cheater version, we are swapping out thin slices of sirloin with ground beef. Bulgogi is also marinated overnight to enhance its flavors and tenderness but with this quick ground beef version, you can have the same flavors in lightning speed time.
Why You’ll Love This Korean Beef Bowl
- Weeknight hero. With a short ingredient list, these beef bowls come together incredibly fast. The cooking process itself takes just about 10-15 minutes, and if you have some leftover cooked rice lying around, dinner will be on the table in 20 minutes or less. It’s a budget-friendly alternative to traditional bulgogi while still capturing authentic Korean BBQ flavors.
- Budget-friendly. Using pantry staples, ground beef and rice, this dish can easily feed a family of four without breaking the bank.
- Flexible recipe. Any lingering veggies (ex. chopped bell peppers, carrots or broccoli florets) can be thrown right in for a great clean-out-the-fridge meal.
Tips for the Best Korean Beef Bowl
- Use reduced sodium soy sauce. Reduced sodium has less sodium and less salt without compromising flavor.
- Use your favorite meat. Ground beef, pork, chicken or turkey, tofu or plant based ground beef will all work very well here.
- Add vegetables. Mushrooms, carrots, bell peppers or snow peas can be added for a more heartier meal.
- More protein. In need of more protein? Top your bowls with a fried egg.
- Double the sauce. Need extra sauce for sopping with rice? The sauce portion can easily be doubled or tripled for those saucy folks!
- Serve with your favorite grains. White rice, brown rice, cauliflower rice, quinoa or farro are all great options.
- Meal prep as needed. Perfect for on-the-go, these Korean beef bowls can be conveniently meal prepped for the week ahead.
What to Serve with Korean Beef Bowls
Tools For This Recipe
Large cast iron skillet
Korean Beef Bowl: Frequently Asked Questions
Bulgogi uses marinated sliced beef, grilled or pan-fried, while Korean beef bowls use ground beef for a faster, budget-friendly weeknight version.
Not at all! Ground pork, chicken or turkey, tofu or plant based ground beef can be used in place of the ground beef.
Absolutely! Here are detailed instructions on how to meal prep this for the week.
Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for 2-3 days.
100%! This is one of our favorite crockpot recipes, perfect for those chilly months.
Yes! You can freeze the leftovers in individual freezer bags, thaw overnight, and reheat on the stovetop (adding a tablespoon of water as needed).
Korean Beef Bowl
Video
Ingredients
- ¼ cup brown sugar, packed
- ¼ cup reduced sodium soy sauce
- 2 teaspoons sesame oil
- ½ teaspoon crushed red-pepper flakes, or more to taste
- ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 pound ground beef
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
- ¼ teaspoon sesame seeds
Instructions
- In a small bowl, whisk together brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, red pepper flakes and ginger.
- Heat vegetable oil in a large cast iron skillet over medium high heat. Add garlic and cook, stirring constantly, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add ground beef and cook until browned, about 3-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the beef as it cooks; drain excess fat.
- Stir in soy sauce mixture and green onions until well combined, allowing to simmer until heated through, about 2 minutes.
- Serve immediately, garnished with green onion and sesame seeds, if desired.
Equipment
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There are so many comments on this recipe that it seems silly to add yet another, but I thought there might be others out there with the same questions about it as I had. I have gestational diabetes and am on a very strict diet that requires ridiculous amounts of protein, and i’m always looking for another way to get enough in that actually appeals to me. So I had to modify this recipe to make it fit my diet needs. Instead of sugar I used unsweetened applesauce, and was worried it wouldn’t taste as good, but it was still delicious! I had to have it over a ton of veggies instead of the rice but that worked out just fine too. i also used Sriracha instead of red pepper flakes, just because I really like Sriracha, and used the less sodium soy sauce. i’m sure that the original version of the recipe is really great but for those of us that need to modify, it still works out just fine. Thanks Chungah!!
This sounds like a good way to use ground beef, besides hamburgers. Besides rice or lettuce cups, what vegetables would you recommend as a side?
Kimchi would be the perfect accompaniment to this dish! 🙂
The beef in your picture has a very fine grind to it- do you grind it yourself or have your butcher grind it down? Usually mine is a lot coarser!
I prefer to purchase ground beef either from Whole Food’s or Trader Joe’s.
This recipe so
rocks !!!!!….even better done with pork..a fave in our house…
I’m going to start by saying I just made this for dinner and I love you recipe.
I’ve been in the military for years and have spent time in Korea as well as have many friends who’s wives are from Korea and have eaten a lot of authentic Korean food, bulgogi being by far my favorite. I have a Korean BBQ restaurant I frequent just to get my bulgogi “fix”.
That being said, your recipe tastes very authentic, especially for being a knock-off version. I’m so happy with this recipe especially since it will save me money on eating out.
I did make one tiny adjustment, I doubled the amount of sauce because typically with bulgogi BBQ you take the little bits of meat and sauce left towards the end of the meal and mix it in rice to make a “soup” out of it and it’s one of the best things about bulgogi. The rice sops up all the liquid and has such a magnificent flavor. So I served mine similar to yours except I poured all the extra sauce over top of it to make it similar to the end of meal “soup”.
Oh, did I say thank you?
Turned out freaking delicious! I had to swap red pepper flakes for a little cayenne pepper since I was out, and I used low sodium soy sauce instead of the regular stuff since my family isn’t a fan of salty things. Also added some edamame at the last minute for a pop of color and some more veggies. Not too salty, not too sweet, very quick to make. I’m a college student back home from university for summer, but I know I’ll be more than happy to make this after a long day of classes and work.
Yummy-yum-yum! I made this tonight and it was a total hit! I used 2lbs of ground beef but didn’t double the rest of the recipe, I did this to make it less sweet and it came out perfect. I used coconut aminos instead of soy sauce and coconut aminos are a little sweeter so that helped, I also added a bit more ginger to taste since there was more meat. I’m so glad I read the comments first, I went and bought TOASTED sesame oil rather than using the regular sesame oil I already had, I could really taste the toastiness (not a real word) and I loved it. Next time I will add carrot matchsticks and serve over shredded cabbage.
This was great. Mine came up a little to the dry side. I would like to know what and how I would add some vegetables. I didn’t have sesame oil on hand, so I just used canola oil. I love how quick it is, and I loved the test.
Thank you for trying my recipe! But was the meat overcooked? It certainly should not have a dry outcome. You can also add veggies such as broccoli, bell peppers, and various other stir-fry type veggies. It may be best to saute them first and set them aside to make sure they are not overcooked.
made this at the beginning of the week, for the first time, and am making it again tonight :). It was so delicious!! Even my “I don’t like rice” kid ate it up!
Is it dry ground ginger?
Yes, that’s exactly right.
Found this recipe to use up my ground beef. It’s delicious and my kids literally devoured it! It is so easy and really flavorful. I skipped the red pepper flakes, my kids are 1 and 3, and added carrots. I will definite;y make this again and again.
I made this and it was delicious! I eyeballed the red pepper flakes which in my house means shake until it’s completely red. The extra heat was really good!
Mine felt a little dry and I wonder if it’s because I used fresh grated ginger since I didn’t have ground ginger. Could the fibers of the ginger have made the meat have a dryer texture the way lemongrass sometimes does to some proteins?
What kind of meat did you use? I have found that 80/20 ground beef is the most flavorful.
I love the flavor and simplicity of this dish! I tweaked it a bit:
I cooked the meat through and drained excess fat before adding finely chopped 4 garlic and 4 shiitake mushrooms! added the same sauce mix
I cooked grilled onions, broccoli, and carrots separately from the meat and used as toppings.
I also added a poached egg! it was heavenly!
I just made this today and it was delicious!!! I will definitely be making it again.
This recipe was a hit with the family at dinner tonight! I was looking for something that combined the ingredients I wanted to use up in my refrigerator- 1 lb. ground elk, fresh ginger root, green onion, and garlic. I was thinking of some kind of teriyaki-like concoction with a lot of sauce using those ingredients, but I’m so glad I came across you recipe instead! It was great with ground elk, which I have a ton of after hunting season and always need new and interesting ways to prepare. This is a winner to add to my pinterest recipe box. Thanks!
Made this twice – first time same as your recipe. Tonight I used sirloin steak and added an orange pepper. Delicious both times but better tonight. I feel like it needs the pepper and maybe I’ll add mushrooms next time too. But really, really delicious!!
I made this and added 1 Red Bell pepper chopped into square chunks, 1 head of baby bok choy (I will add 2 baby bok choy heads next time), whole white mushrooms cut into slices, and 1/2 lb of beef as well as all of the other ingredients and green onions. It was delicious. You could probably use the whole pound of beef, but I would make some extra sauce so that you have some for the rice. It was so good, my husband has been waiting for me to make a good asian dish, the others were sub par…this one was Excellent! Thanks for the recipe. 🙂
Just finished making this and it is the best thing I have ever made. Thank you!!! Yummmm.
I have tried various Korean restaurants since my deployment to Korea and they have not hit the mark. This recipe flooded my taste buds with the EXACT flavor I had been craving since I left Korea. Thank you so much for sharing this will definitely become a staple in my household.
I have made this several times already. My husband actually texts me from work and asks me to make it for dinner. 😀 We love it. Thanks for sharing. I have also used 7% lean ground turkey in place of beef when I didn’t have any, and it turned out great!