Taco Rice Recipe (Hamburger Helper Crunchy Taco Copycat Recipe)

I have been on a mission to use up things in the freezer and pantry.  I bought Minute Rice awhile back when they were super cheap.  I use it to add to soup and other things but really haven't used a lot of it so I precooked some ground beef and set it aside to make this quick meal when I was doing a big freezer cooking of chili, salsa sloppy joes and sausage sauce.  I forgot to take a picture before I started cooking but I also pulled out the taco seasoning packet that I had in the pantry from my free stockpile from Giant awhile ago.

I added the amount of water to the pan called for with 2 cups of rice on the package.  I stirred in the package of taco seasoning and added the rice.

Since the ground beef was already cooked, I added the ground beef and stirred around in the pan to make sure that I had enough water, seasoning and beef.  I left the heat on even though that wasn't the recipe for the rice but I wanted the ground beef to be heated through.  I put the top to steam the rice and meat together.

I covered it with cheese and put the top on so that it would be nice and melted.  I used cheddar and Oaxaca because that is what we had in the house and it was a perfect blend.  This is the same thing that we used to do with the Crunchy Taco Hamburger Helper because my husband hated the cheese sauce that came in the box.

We served with tortilla chips on the side for a crunch if wanted.  There were leftovers which I thought I was going to put into enchiladas but we actually ate them before I even got a chance to see how those would be.  We just heated in the microwave and put on some more cheese.

This was a super quick meal and I thought it was a great way to stretch the ground beef because I didn't use a whole pound of ground beef but you can add as much as you want.  I will totally make this again because we enjoyed it!  I think that I will add it to the menu plan in the coming month to use up the rest of the rice.  Then I will have to figure out if I can recreate with normal rice.

Taco Rice

2 cups Minute Rice or Instant Rice

1 package Taco Seasoning

1/2-1 lb Cooked Ground Beef

2 cups water

Cheese to Taste

Add water to pan and stir in taco seasoning packet over medium heat.  Add 2 cups of instant rice and stir and cover.  Add cooked ground beef and reduce to low heat.  Cover for 20 minutes.  Top with cheese and cover until melted.  Serve hot with tortilla or corn chips.