Taco Salad and Tacos
January 14, 2022 • 0 comments
Tacos and taco salads are one of our favorite meals. We usually do tacos at least once per month. We prepare extras so that we have leftovers during the week for lunch or for a quicker meal on those hectic days when the kids have extracurricular activities like piano lessons, sports etc.
The problem with most taco seasonings is that they contain lots of MSGs, added salts, and other processed chemicals that are not good for us. Finding healthy alternatives in local grocery stores is difficult, so I purchase organic taco seasoning with no added fillers in 16-24oz containers and keep it in our pantry.
I prefer fresh, locally grown leaf lettuces, but they are hard to find. So leaf lettuces in grocery stores work well, but most of the time Romaine lettuce is the most nutritious lettuce that we can find consistently. From what I understand, Iceberg lettuce contains very little nutrition compared to romaine and leaf lettuces, plus tastes bland to me.
In the absence of fresh tomatoes, I use salsa. Read the label carefully, many salsas contain added sugars, avoid them. Also, if you cannot pronounce the ingredients on the label or if you do not know what they are, find a better salsa.
I prefer ground pork for tacos, but any healthy ground meat will work. In terms of health benefits, I use either pasture raised ground pork or our grass finished beef. Ground turkey is an option, but only if it is pasture raised with non-gmo feed supplements. In my opinion, conventionally raised turkey is not a healthier alternative to pasture raised pork or grass-finished beef.
Ingredients
- (2 lbs.) Ground Pork
- (1/4 - 1/2 cup) Organic Taco Seasoning
- (To taste) Salt
- (1) Red Onion
- (1) Yellow Onion
- Fresh Tomatoes (if in season)
- (1 head) Romaine Lettuce
- (To taste) Salsa
- (1) Avocado - Diced
- Cheese - Grated
- Organic/Blue Taco Shells (Optional)
- Organic/Blue Tostitos Style Chip (Optional)
- Tortillas (Optional)
- Cilantro - Chopped (Optional)
Directions
- If using onions, dice them up in smallish size pieces, if not using onions skip to step 3.
- Sauté onions in pan until they are soft using a little bit of lard, bacon grease, or avocado oil
- Add pastured ground pork (or grass finished lean ground beef) to the onions and lightly salt the meat. Cook over low to medium-high heat until brown, stirring occasionally and breaking the meat up into smaller pieces.
- While onions are sautéing and meat is browning, chop up the lettuce, tomatoes, avocados, cilantro and other ingredients.
- Once the meat is browned, add this taco seasoning to enough water to barely cover the meat and let simmer, stirring occasionally, until most of the liquid cooks off. 1/4th of a cup to 1-2 pounds of ground meat.
- If using taco shells or tortillas, cook according to instructions on package.
- Tip - when we use tortillas, I turn our gas cook-top on medium-high heat and place a tortilla directly on the eye for 1-5 seconds and then flip it. If you have an electric cook-top, you can put a pan on the electric eye and accomplish the same thing.
- Assemble the ingredients together.
- For salads, place a few chips (if using them) on the bottom of a large plate, add some of the taco meat with onions. Layer romaine lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, salsa, cilantro, avocado, and other items on the salad. Enjoy
- For Tacos, add the ingredients to the shells or tortillas and enjoy.
- You can freeze any leftover meat that you might have and use it later. This is a great way of cooking larger batches for 1-2 people and using the later.
