Peanut Butter Steak Casserole

Stop a beat before you scroll past this one. Peanut butter and ground beef sounds like a kitchen experiment that went wrong, but it’s actually a Midwestern take on West African groundnut stew. Peanuts and meat are a flavor pairing as old as Senegalese cooking, and once you taste it, it makes sense.

The peanut butter does two things. It thickens the sauce as the casserole bakes, replacing the need for flour or starch, and it adds a deep, savory richness that pairs surprisingly well with the acidity of tomato sauce. Sweetness, salt, fat, acid. All four corners of flavor are covered.

Ground round is leaner than ground chuck, which keeps the casserole from getting greasy. Brown it hard with chopped onion to build the base. Then everything (cooked rice, carrot, celery, green pepper, eggs, peanut butter, tomato sauce) gets stirred together and baked low for an hour.

The eggs bind it all together as it cooks. You end up with a sliceable, scoopable casserole somewhere between a meatloaf and a baked rice dish.

Pro Tips

• Use natural peanut butter for the deepest flavor, but stir it well first because it separates. Conventional peanut butter is sweeter and changes the flavor profile.
• Cook the rice slightly underdone. It will continue absorbing moisture in the oven and you don’t want mushy rice.
• Stir hot, browned beef into the peanut butter-tomato mixture gradually. Cold meat dropped into peanut butter clumps.
• Top with chopped peanuts and fresh cilantro before serving for a finishing crunch and herbal lift.

Variations

• Add a tablespoon of curry powder or garam masala for an Indian-inspired version.
• Stir in a can of crushed pineapple for sweetness that plays surprisingly well with peanut butter.
• Use ground chicken or turkey in place of beef for a lighter take.