The Best Sloppy Joes
Quick and easy, these really are the best sloppy joes ever! The bold, exciting flavors make these a tried-and-true favorite!
When is the last time you found yourself craving a sloppy joe?
If your answer is “next to never,” I can’t blame you.
Thanks to a few Dreaded Dinners of my Youth, sloppy joes made the short list of meals I never planned to introduce to my children.
That is, until I took a chance on this new and improved version, and I was totally won over and amazed by how good a sloppy joe could be!
Over ten years later, and these have become a tried-and-true recipe. They are the only sloppy joes we make! And we make them often.
What makes these sloppy joes different?
When you add the right “stuff” to sloppy joes, they quickly go from average to totally spectacular.
Instead of relying on a strong tomato flavor profile that often results in bland, boring sloppy joes, this recipe goes straight for the flavor jugular.
BBQ sauce builds the foundation of flavor while tomato sauce, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce round everything out.
Choose a BBQ sauce you really, really love. My favorite store bought brands are Sweet Baby Rays and Kinders. This is my go-to homemade BBQ sauce recipe.
The meat is saturated with bold, savory flavors instead of swimming in a thin, wimpy sauce.
Not only will this make your taste buds really happy, it also helps avoid the dreaded soggy bun issue.
Because, soggy bread should have never, ever been invented. It’s the worst.
Quick and Easy
These really are the best sloppy joes. And they are so quick and easy to make.
A few notes:
- the ground beef can easily be subbed out for ground turkey
- serve them on hamburger buns, brioche buns, homemade french bread rolls, or over cornbread with cheese
- the prepared sloppy joe meat can be refrigerated for several days and reheated AND it also freezes great
I’ve made these sloppy joes dozens and dozens of times for our little family, and I’ve also made enormous batches to serve crowds upwards of 150 people.
It’s safe to say that these sloppy joes are always a hit.
This sloppy joe recipe is a fan favorite even among past sloppy joe haters!
Allison: Just made this tonight-and adding it to our growing list of amazing recipes from you! Even though I was nervous about trying sloppy joes, my husband said, “has Mel ever let us down?” Haha they are delicious!
Laurel: Our whole family loved this! (And hubby is not a sloppy joe fan )
Ashley S.: This is on regular rotation in my house. It converted my Sloppy-Joe-hating fiancé into someone who regularly requests this dinner. I also love how quick this is to throw together. Thanks for another winner!
Elizabeth: I love these so much I want to cry and hug you. Odd reaction to a sloppy joe? Maybe. But I love them. They are exactly what I’ve always pictured a sloppy joe to be but it just never was. Thank you!!!
What to Serve With This
- French Bread Rolls
- Coleslaw or Boston Baked Beans
- Fresh vegetables and/or green salad
One Year Ago: Copycat Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Recipe {Pressure Cooker or Slow Cooker}
Two Years Ago: Homemade Canned Spaghetti Sauce {Step-by-Step Tutorial}
Three Years Ago: Cheesy Baked Ziti {Make-Ahead/Freezer Meal}
Four Years Ago: The Best Homemade Salsa {Fresh or For Canning}
Five Years Ago: Portillo’s Chopped Salad with Sweet Italian Dressing
Six Years Ago: Sweet Paprika Skillet Chicken
Seven Years Ago: Sweet Mustard Baked Chicken
Eight Years Ago: Succulent Grilled Pork Tenderloin
The Best Sloppy Joes
Ingredients
- ½ cup diced onion
- 2 ½ pounds ground beef or ground turkey
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- ⅔ cup BBQ sauce (see note)
- ½ cup ketchup
- ¼ cup Worcestershire sauce
- ¼ cup soy sauce, I use low-sodium
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- Rolls or buns, for serving
Instructions
- In a 12-inch nonstick skillet set over medium heat, add the onions and beef (or ground turkey). Cook, breaking the meat into small pieces, until the meat is cooked through and the onions are translucent, 7-8 minutes. Drain excess grease.
- Stir in the tomato paste, BBQ sauce, ketchup, Worcestershire, and soy sauce and a pinch of black pepper. Bring the mixture to a simmer ,and cook until the sauce is slightly thickened, 4 to 5 minutes. Add additional salt and pepper, to taste, if needed.
- Serve the sloppy joe meat warm on buns or rolls.
Notes
Recommended Products
Recipe Source: adapted from Dave Lieberman
Delicious. I have never really been a fan of sloppy joes, too often they’re not much more than meat in a bland tomato sauce but this one is very different. The combo of bbq sauce, Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce is perfect. I used ground turkey and potato bread rolls…yum
I’m so happy this recipe won you over to sloppy joe’s!
These were terrific, Mel. A fabulous marriage of flavors. And so easy!
Thanks, Sarah!
My sloppy joe hating children loved these. They proclaimed them amazing, and I was asked to make them again the next day. Needless to say it is going into the regular rotation. Wish I would have discovered it sooner. Mel – thanks for another winning recipe.
This makes me so happy, Tracy! I swear, for every sloppy joe hating child (or adult) that is converted by this recipe, it adds a year to my life. 🙂
This is a great recipe, so quick and easy but tasty! I snuck in some minced carrots grated zucchini and lentils to the meat —My kids loved it! This will make it into our meal rotation for sure!
Oooh, LOVE those extra additions!
I made this tonight and it was delicious! Most of my kids even liked it, which is a win in our house
Love hearing this – thanks, Diana!
My very picky hubby will actually eat these sloppy joes and not whine about them! Have been making them for many years. Thanks for the great recipe, Mel!
That’s awesome, Becky! gotta love meals that win over the picky eaters. 🙂
We LOVE this recipe!! We recently had to change to a meat free diet for most meals. We use this recipe, but replace the pounds of meat with equal pound of cooked lentils. Works GREAT! Flavor is there and we don’t have to feel like we are compeltely missing out on one of our favorite meals! (we still think the meat version is the BEST but our lentil version is pretty great). 🙂
I think lentils are pretty awesome and love that they work in this recipe. Thanks for letting me know, Laura!
Sounds wonderful! I’ve never liked Sloppy Joe’s either, for the same reasons. These look great, but I may try your Philly Cheesesteak Sloppy Joes first. Mushrooms and cheese got my attention!
This recipe is a winner and I didn’t think I liked sloppy joes either! I add 1 Tbsp brown sugar and that little bit of sweetness makes it perfect for our family!
I make these once a month! We’ve also served them over baked potatoes or sweet potatoes with a little shredded cheese on top. These Sloppy Joes are delicious!
We just made these over the weekend. They are so delicious, and I love that they can be made ahead!
I haven’t had sloppy joes in years but I decided to make these on a whim tonight since our usual ground meat options seem to be on repeat a little too often lately. I used ground turkey and Sweet Baby Ray’s and I can’t believe what a big hit they were with everyone in my family! My 7 year old kept saying, “mmm, sloppy joes are sooo good” and all the kids asked for seconds, which is pretty much unheard of. Thanks for another winner, Mel! Your recipes never fail me!
Hi Mel
I am using just sweet baby rays tonight, thats what I had. The original. But do you have a store bought brand and flavor you reccomend for the smokiness?
Kinders is one of my favorite storebought brands (so is Sweet Baby Rays) but neither of them are quite as smoky as I’d like. I used to be able to find a variation of KC masterpiece that was specifically labeled “smoky” – in a pinch, I add a dash of liquid smoke to the sloppy joes.
We just had these tonight…every time I make them my family can’t stop saying how good they are, and that I need to make them more often! I love to serve my portion over quinoa instead of on a roll…so good!!
Another hit from Mel! I like to make this with a 20 oz ground turkey and then add a bunch of veggies (mushrooms, carrot, bell pepper) all finely diced or shredded. The kids don’t notice and love this meal. They are still a bit young, 3 and 2, so let’s see how long I can keep that up!
Made your French roll recipe as well, and it was a wonderful dinner. Thanks for always providing my family with tasty recipes!
I tripled this recipe to feed 16 youth and 3 leaders today. They gobbled it all up! I have parents texting me asking for the recipe 🙂 I’m sending them to your site with the recommendation to try more of your recipes. Thanks!
Glad it was such a hit, Tanya. Thank you!
Have you ever tried adding quinoa to this? I like to stretch my meat where I can (I guess that wouldn’t be an issue if I raised my own, but I don’t) so this time I used about 2/3 ground beef and 1/3 quinoa (cooked in beef broth). It was awesome! I think I love it more than the original (though I do love the original too) because it just feels lighter on my stomach. Oh–I never have Worcestershire sauce on hand so I just add extra bbq sauce to make up for the missing volume.
Love the idea of adding quinoa, Anna! I’m going to try that!
I’ve subbed half of the ground turkey for quinoa and it worked great!
Not sure how this one got by me for so long, but this is my new standard for sloppy joes! We loved this so much. I served it over sweet cornbread and sprinkled some cheese on it.
Just made this tonight-and adding it to our growing list of amazing recipes from you! Even though I was nervous about trying sloppy joes, my husband said, “has Mel ever let us down?” Haha they are delicious-thanks for all you do!
Yay! So happy to hear that!
Delicious I make it all the time! How many calories per cup do you know?
I don’t know, sorry!
I love your recipe. I first made it a year ago and it has become a staple weeknight dinner in our home.
Well that was hilarious. Note to self, don’t try to multi-task by talking to your brother on your cell while making dinner. You just might pull the frozen chipotle pepper in adobe sauce out of the freezer instead of the tomato paste. And then you won’t notice until you see the skin of the pepper and think “this tomato paste is weird…” . But all was well, we like chilies. I added the tomato paste anyway and the sloppy Joes had an awesome smoky flavor. Thanks for a great recipe. I promise to pay more attention next time! Or maybe not, this turned out so well.
We just served 8o people sloppy joes at our reunion. Someone asked me if we were serving sliced hamburger dill pickles on them. I tried it on the leftovers when we got home and we actual liked it. I had never heard of eating sloppy joes with dill pickles.
This is THE BEST sloppy joe recipe I have ever tried. I was going through chemo a few years back and didn’t feel up to cooking every day. I cooked a lot of plan ahead meals like spaghetti, meatloaf , and yes this sloppy joe recipe. Froze all of the meals for my “bad days “ but it seemed as though I went for the sloppy joe most often and gave out of that first. Thanks Mel for a great recipe!
Thank you so much, Linda! I hope you are feeling much better these days!
These are awesome!!
Our whole family loved this! (And hubby is not a sloppy joe fan )
My kids loved it. Delicious.
Any suggestions on how to do this in an instapot? I’m new to the instapot 🙂
I haven’t made these in the IP, but I suppose you could brown the ground beef, drain, add the other ingredients and cook on high pressure for a couple minutes. They are pretty fast on the stovetop so I haven’t done an IP conversion yet.
Very good!
Make this for my family often and we all love it! Now I am wanting to make it for our church group, which is about 40 people. How many recipes should I make? 5? Asking because you said you have made this for 100!
If your group is mostly average eaters (no one who will eat a ton of sandwiches!), I think you could get away with 5X-ing the recipe. Good luck!
This is on regular rotation in my house. It converted my Sloppy-Joe-hating fiancé into someone who regularly requests this dinner. I also love how quick this is to throw together. Thanks for another winner!
Really good. I add a splash of apple cider vinegar for a little extra flavor.
these are so good and easy, always a winner when the littles will eat it too!
I made this with half quinoa/brown rice and half ground beef. Some of my kids didn’t love it (I’m not sure they’ve ever had sloppy joes before, so I think that is the reason) but my husband and I and the other kids thought it was delicious. Thank you for the recipe!
This recipe saved dinner tonight! I had thawed beef for chili but didn’t make it to the store for the other ingredients. I had everything for these, and I thought it was really good! One kid liked it and one didn’t, which is actually more than like my chili, so there ya go! We served it over baked potatoes and I used half the amount of Worcestershire. Thanks, Mel!
Can you adapt this recipe to a slow cooker?
I haven’t tried it but you can definitely experiment!
Hi Mel,
I’ll be making this soon with ground turkey, homemade is so much better than the canned Manwich stuff. Have you ever made lentil sloppy joe’s? They’re really delicious and healthy and freeze really well. My kids will eat them which is always a bonus.
Tried this recipe tonight & halved it because we don’t have huge eaters in my family. Maybe I didn’t quite get it right, but the soy sauce was WAY too much – too salty for me. So, I ended up putting in about 1/3c water, additional ~1/4c ketchup, ~2T brown sugar, splash of red wine vinegar & a dab or two more of paste. I also added garlic & green pepper. It ended up pretty good. But probably will use my other sloppy joe recipe, or just won’t use quite as much soy sauce. Maybe start with 2-3T & add more to taste???
Could you please tell me what a “sloppy joe” is, I have heard of them in connection with food, but do not know what they are! This is what we call a loose casual sweater.
The origin is from key West fl. A guy who’s name was sloppy joe
Making these again for the umpteenth time! Delivering to a lady from church who had recent surgery.
Made these today for dinner later. Just the 2 of us do I portionedf it out for later. Made exactly as written with 50/50 ground beef & turkey. Rolls are in the oven. My house smells goooood. Thanks for the great recipes. We had your chicken taco salad last night & it was a winner.
I like sloppy joes but my family doesn’t. Never the canned stuff and all the homemade versions I’ve seen or tried are loaded with copious amount of sugar and/or ketchup. I means CUPS of the stuff! It’s like eating ketchup-y, super-sweet burgers or taco filling.
I will be trying this and the boston baked beans and see how that goes. I agree that the bread/roll can make or break a recipe. I’m going to try them with our favorite Light Brioche rolls I found a few yrs back from another blogger. They’re beyond addicting.
SO many great recipes on your site. My printer and pinterest can’t keep up!
Hope you like them, Julia! You’ll have to share your brioche roll recipe; I’d love to try it!
Mel has never let me down. Seriously, every recipe is a favorite of my family.
I am a long-time fan but tried two new recipes last weekend and this weekend. Sloppy joes were another hit!
P.S.: I really appreciated your wellness post on your recent surgery. You look great and are healing up well!
I love these so much I want to cry and hug you. Odd reaction to a sloppy joe? Maybe. But I love them. They are exactly what I’ve always pictured a sloppy joe to be but it just never was.
Thank you!!!
What size onion & what kind did you use in this recipe? One of my kids said it was too onion-ey. I loved them!
Excellent and easy.
These are so yummy! I asked my husband (who isn’t such a fan of sloppy joes) if he liked them and he said “Yes, those were good! What did you do different [from my normal recipe]?”
how is there NO garlic in this!??!!? it does not compute….. mel+kitchen-garlic=best recipe ever? hmmmm……. i added a bit of costco’s garlic and it made them PERFECT. I love you …. but you have neglected your best friend in this recipe….. (garlic!)
My husband agrees with the title of the recipe. Best sloppy joes ever!
Oh and something funny…growing up my mom always served sloppy joes with cottage cheese. So now I have to have those two together. SO weird, I know. But it is GOOD!
So Mel have you ever put this in the crockpot? This looks delicious. On the menu for Sunday dinner. 🙂
I haven’t but I think it would work well if you made it on the stove and kept it warm in the crockpot. So…did the cottage cheese go ON the sloppy joes or just as a side dish?