It's so much fun to set up this "choose your own ingredients" meal for company and watch the choices and how they build their own tacos. As for the taco shells, you can make it easier on yourself by simply serving soft shells by heating the corn tortillas in a microwave tortilla warmer instead of frying them ahead in oil.
Here's a list of my favorite taco ingredients to prepare and set out. The bonus is that any leftovers can be used to make your own personal "build your own taco salads" the next day including crumbling any leftover chips into it.
Set everything out and let the fun begin!
Besides the taco ingredients I make corn tortilla chips by deep frying them instead of serving store bought and make a simple guacamole and con queso for an alternative dipping sauce other than just salsa. Oh, and black olives on the side to help cut the heat for the jalapeno lovers ;-)
By Deeli from Richland, WA
Combine first 3 ingredients with 1/2 teaspoon salt in bowl, mixing well. Knead on floured board until smooth. Divide into portions and roll out individual fry breads.
Traditional chorizo originated in Spain and Portugal and is a pork sausage seasoned with paprika. Some current versions are significantly more spicy than the original sausages. Use a spicy chorizo blend when making tacos instead of ground beef.
A simple, quick meal can be rolled up in a soft taco with precooked chicken and many ingredients you probably have at home. This page contains an easy soft tacos recipe.
Weave some bacon together to make a crispy breakfast taco shell. This is a page about making a woven bacon shell breakfast taco.
Tacos are a dinner option that is easy to make inexpensively. This is a page about $10 soft tacos dinner recipe.
After browning off your meat and making the sauce, use your food processor to almost puree the sauce. Taco Bell copycat?
This is a page about making taco shells. It is easy to make your own taco shells at home while preparing the rest of the meal.
A delicious alternative to the typical meat taco is a seafood taco. This page contains seafood taco recipes.
This page contains vegetarian taco recipes. For a healthy variation on the typical beef or chicken taco, try making vegetarian tacos.
In a hurry to make taco meat for supper? I bought Old El Paso Taco Seasoning in a shaker (instead of a bag) and used what I thought would be good. I added Old El Paso mild salsa and a little bit of garlic salt. It was wonderful!
Thinly slice the steaks (as for stir-fry). Sprinkle steaks with salt; set aside. For sauce, in small bowl whisk together coffee, ketchup, and chili powder.
Cover the bottom of 6-inch non-stick frying pan with 1/2 cup of the Mexican-blend cheese. Fry until it is lightly browned on one side.
Cook your ground beef, add onion, salt, pepper, garlic and anything else you like. Set it aside in a bowl near the pan. Clean the pan or use a clean frying pan. Put about a Tbsp. of oil in the pan and let it get hot enough to sizzle if you flick a drop of water at it (stand back, lol).
