The best beans ever thread inspired me. Let's hear your best authentic taco recipe, including but not limited to marinades. I'll start the contribution by submitting pork tacos. I saute onion in a skillet of smoked pulled pork lard. Toss in some left over pulled pork and heat it up. On a properly heated corn tortilla, add the pork and onion, maybe a bit of fresh onion also, cilantro, diced serrano, lime juice and that's it. Consider it a base recipe that you can modify and make your own. What do y'all like in a taco?

{quote] and that's it.{/quote]

What's left?? I kid.

I go the opposite route. meat, cheese, maybe taco sauce.

Meat is browned, then put in chili powder, garlic powder, onion powder, cayenne, salt, and a cup or two of water. Cook til water is gone.

Add some lettuce and tomatoes markandles and you're good to go. Perhaps sour cream

Made brisket tacos this afternoon from the remainder of the brisket I cooked last weekend.

Jack In the Box.

EOT

My shrimp tacos on the Bull Red trips are the best I make.

My sauce has cajun spice, molasses, lime juice, pineapple juice, garlic, salt and pepper. I put that on the small peeled shrimp and cook them on the cowboy wok until done.

Sides include cheese, sour cream, fresh pico, with HEB flour tortillas.

Man, I need to cook some now! It's making me hungry just thinking about it!

This is the kinship I feel toward my fellow Texans! Unless they are "undocumented workers", no one within a seven hour drive from me has tacos on the brain. I made tacos last week from skirt steak, over mesquite charcoal. I lost almost half the purchase weight due to trimming the skin and fat. Lesson learned there! We also need a tortilla thread to debate flour vs. corn.

As far as tortillas go, I usually go with flour, because good corn tortillas are few and far between it seems.

I'm a fan of tacos de mollejas. We take the little fish grilling racks that sandwich together and sandwich the mollejas with onion and a bit of season all. Cook until done over hot coals and serve with fresh corn tortillas and chopped onion/cilantro/Serranos and a slice of avocado. Pretty good way to get your cholesterol cranked up.

Let the drooling begin.

The only good corn tortilla, to me, is a fresh home made tortilla. Flour tortillas reheated over a heavy, dry skillet are wonderful also! We can also start a tortilla thread! Skirt or flank steak makes great beef tacos. Especially when grilled over mesquite charcoal. In Oaxaca City, you can go to the market and buy carne asada steak, and cook it over coals already hot there in the the market. You have to go to the onion man for the onions, then the cilantro guy, then the Dos Equis, guy etc. but by then end of the buying expedition, magic happens! I have photos to prove it!

If anybody has a recipe for Tupi tacos, I'd love to get it.

For those not aware, they are from Tupinamba's, a fine Aggie establishment in North Dallas.

Basically a fried taco. Just a tortilla and some sort of meat mixture in it. Almost like a meat puree.

If I described it more, it would sound like an empanada, but it's not.

Could be rat meat for all I know, but man, they are delicious.

From experience, the Mexicans that sacked feed at Producer's Co-op back in the '90s would sell fresh killed pigeons to the "taco man" that would turn around and sell the fresh tacos to the struggling college students that loaded the sacks on customer's trucks. They were good tacos but it was always a debate on the type of meat judging by the texture and color of the meat. I didn't believe it until I saw a full grain sack of something trailing pigeon feathers getting loaded into the "taco" man's Lincoln Continental.

Hey, if it tastes good, don't question it. That's how I feed coyote to folks, right up until they start asking questions.

Dang phone changed some words on me.

[This message has been edited by ursusguy (edited 5/5/2013 11:41p).]

I tried that with what I thought was "snowshoe hare" in Wyoming. Hey, they turned white in the winter. How was I to know that I was feeding folks northern jackrabbit and wondering why we weren't getting filled up with fried "snowshoe", compared to the fried cottontail I was also shooting. That's how one really acquires an education, I suppose. On an up note, the sage and blue grouse hunting was excellent there!

Turn them into taco meat.

I tried bringing that "rabbit" to work. Working construction through a Wyoming winter is not the place, I discovered, to introduce "snowshoe hare" to undocumented workers. You will starve to death trying to survive on that meat! I also discovered there are Mexicans who are ashamed of themselves as Mexicans because a white guy can show up for work and bring lunch that is too hot for them to eat! That's when I learned I can bring the heat to work when I wanted too!

We eat a lot of fish tacos at my house. I pan sear whatever fish we are catching (sheephead lately) in olive oil with some blackened redfish magic seasoning and lime juice. We make fresh pico and guacamole and chile con queso. Serve with fresh hot corn tortillas and shredded cabbage. Wash down with ice cold Dos Equis or Tecate.

This thread is not what I was hoping for...

But, it has still delivered in its own way. Carry on.

Flour Tortillas - assuming you are no using homemade right off the press, how do you reheat them? Steam? Dry skillet?

Over coals or a dry skillet. My current favorites, outside of the ones my home town cafe makes, are the par-cooked ones that HEB carries.

Anyone have a good basic taco meat seasoning recipe? Homemade...

Teacher girlfriend fries up the fresh corn taco shells. I'm spoiled now. She also shreds chicken breast for chicken tacos. I like mine with fresh avacodo, lettuce, tomato, cheese, and homemade salsa (mine is better than hers).

I think most people mess up by over seasoning homemade tacos

I use 1lb ground beef 85/15 or 80/20
vegetable oil
1/2 large onion diced
1 clove garlic
about 1/4c of some green pepper - bell, anaheim, or poblano diced
1.5 tsp salt
2 tsp fresh pepper
1tsp cumin

Sweat veggies in oil then add ground beef. Brown meat and then add seasonings. Add 1 cup of water and simmer until fully evaporated

On my iPad WC so I couldn't respond to your PM. It's bizarre for some reason I cant type in the PM text box




[This message has been edited by Gruene town FIDO (edited 5/6/2013 1:59p).]

Fido, cool, thanks.

quote:

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Basically a fried taco. Just a tortilla and some sort of meat mixture in it. Almost like a meat puree.

If I described it more, it would sound like an empanada, but it's not.

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i've never been to tupi's but it sounds similar to something I do on occasion. I'll make the recipe I posted then run the cooked meat through a fine plate on my meat grinder. This gives you a texture much like ravioli filling which is what i stole the technique from.

I'll then take the meat and put it in a corn tortilla, seal it with a little thin masa, and deep fry them. I'll make them for parties and serve with shredded lettuce, guac, cour cream, and pico

quote:

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because good corn tortillas are few and far between it seems.

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No, it's because there is no such thing as a good corn tortilla. Not, at least, prior to said tortilla being fried in oil to make a big corn tortilla chip. Then it's good.