Mexican Style Ground Beef Dish
Looking for a new twist on typical ground beef dinners? Try making Picadillo, a flavorful but not hot Mexican ground beef dish prepared with potatoes, carrots, raisins, and tomato sauce. Every Mexican family makes a variation of this dish.
It’s versatile. Use it as taco meat, serve over rice or on a tostada. Kids love it. Make a double batch. It keeps well in the freezer. It will become one of your favorite ground beef recipes. It’s one of ours.
How to Make Picadillo
It is easy to make and preparation is similar to dishes you probably already know.
Start by gathering all of your ingredients for the recipe.
- 2 lbs low-fat ground beef
- 2 medium white potatoes
- 2 medium carrots
- 1 cup green peas (preferably frozen peas not canned)
- ½ cup raisins
- 1 cup tomato sauce
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
Both Seasoned or unseasoned tomato sauce work well in this dish. It is more typical in Mexico to use seasoned tomato sauce. Frozen peas are preferable to canned.
First Steps
- Peel the carrots and potatoes first.
- Chop the potatoes and carrots. We like the potatoes and carrots on the chunky side especially when we serve the picadillo over rice. If you plan on making tacos de picadillo chop the potatoes and carrots into smaller pieces.
Time to Cook
- Add the ground beef to a large preheated frying pan with 2 tablespoons of cooking oil.
- Gently break up the meat so that it browns evenly.
- Lightly brown the ground beef. Try not to over brown the meat because it will be on the dry side. Use this picture as a guide.
- Don’t drain the liquid that the meat gives off. It incorporates into the dish and enriches the flavor.
- Add the potatoes and carrots to the ground beef and cook for about 6 minutes.
- Add the raisins and green peas to the mixture.
- Mix until all of the ingredients are evenly dispersed.
- Season with 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon black pepper.
- Add the tomato sauce.
- Mix in the tomato sauce until it is fully incorporated.
- Cook the picadillo over medium-low heat for about 20 minutes until the liquid has reduced and the potatoes and carrots are fully cooked and have softened.
- Taste and add salt if necessary.
How to Serve Picadillo
- Serve over white rice, on a tostada or as taco filling or even by itself.
Looks good, doesn’t it?
How do you prefer your picadillo? Over rice? In a taco? Or on a tostada? If you make tacos, corn and flour tortillas are both good choices.
Optional Ingredients
Picadillo is easily adaptable to your tastes. Here are a couple of variations that we like.
- You can add ½ cup chopped white onion if you like. Add the onion at the same time you add the potatoes and carrots.
- If you want your picadillo to be spicy, add 1 or 2 very finely chopped serrano chiles when you add the potato and carrots.
Mexican Picadillo Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 lbs low-fat ground beef
- 2 medium white potatoes
- 2 medium carrots
- 1 cup green peas preferably use frozen peas not canned
- ½ cup raisins
- 1 cup tomato sauce
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
Instructions
- Peel the carrots and potatoes first.
- Chop the potatoes and carrots.
- Preheat 2 tablespoons of cooking oil in a large frying pan over medium-high heat.
- Add the ground beef to the frying pan and lightly brown the ground beef. (about 5 minutes)
- Add the potatoes and carrots, stir and cook for 6 minutes.
- Add the raisins and peas and stir.
- Add the tomato sauce, salt and black pepper and stir.
- Reduce to medium-low heat and cook for 20 minutes until the liquid has reduced and the potatoes and carrots have softened.
- Taste and add salt if necessary.
Notes
- Picadillo should be moist but not wet when served.
- If it is starting to get dry before the potatoes and carrots are cooked add 2 tablespoons of water as needed so that it remains moist.
- Chop the potatoes coarsely if you are going to serve it over rice or on a tostada. Chop them finer if you are going to serve it in tacos.
- If you are making tacos, it goes well with both corn and flour tortillas.
- If you use canned peas, rinse them well to remove excess salt.
- If you don't have any tomato sauce, use 3 Roma tomatoes that have been smoothly blended as a substitute.
- You can add ½ cup chopped white onion if you like. Add the onion at the same time you add the potatoes and carrots.
- If you want your picadillo to be spicy, add 1 or 2 very finely chopped serrano chiles when you add the potato and carrots.
Timaree says
I’ve only seen this with green olives and I hate green olives. The raisins sound odd to me but I think I will try this with the added onion and peppers. I like raisins; hoping this will be something good!
QueenB says
Great dish! I added onion, 1 tomatoe, and 2 teaspoons of Knorr (chicken flavor) along with 2 cans of tomatoe sauce. Added salt to taste after I added the Knorr.
Ashley says
This is one of my favorite dishes but I modify quite a bit. I blend tomatoes with the onion and knorr with half to a whole can of chipotle peppers in abodo sauce to make the sauce. I don’t use raisins or peas. My family loves it in tacos, over pasta, and our favorite is in quesadillas.
Douglas Cullen says
Adding chipotle in adobo sounds really good. We’ll have to give it a try! Cheers!
Kate says
This recipe was great! I made it tonight and my husband was skeptical when I told him the ingredients, but he loved it! I made a couple adjustments to use what I had on hand (subbed sweet potatoes for white, subbed edamame for the peas). This is a fast, yummy recipe that will go into our weeknight dinner rotation.
Douglas Cullen says
We’ll have to give sweet potatoes a try. It definitely sounds good! Glad your family is enjoying the recipe. Cheers!
micaela rojas says
fyi, picadillo is accented on the DEE, not the KA.
Diane Villegas says
This is such a versitile dish with so many options. I add chopped onion and garlic to the meat. You could use a different veggie instead of peas like corn, zucchini, beans along with green chiles/jalepenos, chipotle and fresh chopped tomato along with the tomato sauce. Finish it off with chopped cilantro.
julie says
Sounds yummy, and so easy! I love the idea of the raisins.
Danica says
I love this dish! We sometimes switch the raisins with pineapples as my family is not very fond of the raisins. Still, I think raisins give the dish a different kick compared to pineapples. We also use sweet potato at times to substitute potatoes. The sweet potatoes give a sweeter taste.
Thanks for sharing this!
Mimi M says
RAISINS????. PLEASE!!! NO RAISINS in authentic Picadillo. PLEASE don’t call this MEXICAN because it’s NOT.
Douglas Cullen says
Our photographer was born and raised in Cuernavaca and this recipe is based on the way that his mother used to prepare picadillo. Every family has its own way of preparation. That’s why we have included raisins. Cheers!
Keith Sayles says
Really no raisins? Dried fruits have been used in Mexican food for hundreds of years mimi….
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In savory recipes, dried fruit, especially raisins and prunes, have been used in a great number of traditional Mexican dishes, many introduced by the convent cooks as far back as the 16th century. These include several moles, stuffing for turkey, and picadillo. In the realm of sweet dishes, arroz con leche, a creamy rice pudding, nearly always contains raisins, as do sweet tamales and the bread pudding called capirotada. Oaxacan estofado, Aguacalientes style chicken and Puebla’s chiles en nogada are just a few of the regional dishes made with dried fruit.
Michael Keller says
I lived in Monterrey, Nuevo León, México for a total of 10 years. Seven years the first time and 3 years the last time. I have never seen Picadillo with Raisins in it. I don’t know where everyone keeps coming up with this from. None of my in-laws prepared it like that.