My ground beef taco meat recipe is THE way to start building the best tacos. Set up a taco bar buffet for dinner & let everyone top it the way they like it!
This post has been sponsored by The Glad Products Company and Avocados From Mexico. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
When it comes to easy dinner ideas nothing beats taco night, and it doesn’t get easier than prepping our toppings ahead of time with Glad® Press’n Seal®. I don’t have to run around at the last minute trying to make guacamole, dice tomatoes, and shred cheese all while cooking my taco meat recipe. It’s fantastic!
Best of all, even my pickiest eater can make his own custom creation so I know the entire family will have clean plates at the end of our meal!
GROUND BEEF TACO MEAT RECIPE
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The other day I was shopping at Walmart and I saw these beautiful ripe Avocados From Mexico and I got the most undeniable craving for fresh guacamole. This idea sparked my inspiration for Taco Bar Night.
I love tacos so much I tend to go a bit overboard with the ingredients. Since I was already at Walmart, I made sure to pick up Glad Press’n Seal and some extra GladWare Food Storage Containers to keep my Taco Bar fixings fresh in preparation for my madness. When it comes to Taco Night at my house, it’s go big or go home!
That night I had everyone in the house helping out. I had the boys grating cheese, chopping lettuce, pouring salsa. I had my husband mashing up those beautiful Avocados From Mexico to turn them into a masterful guac while I made taco shells and seasoned the taco meat.
Taco Meat Seasoning Recipe
- Ground beef
- Tomato sauce
- Ground cumin
- Ground coriander
- Garlic powder
- Onion powder
- Dried Mexican oregano
- Smoked paprika
- Salt & pepper
- Chili powder
By the end, we had a dozen GladWare containers on the counter all covered in Glad Press’n Seal ready to transfer to the kitchen table. And those extra avocado halves? No problem.
Glad Press’n Seal is your avocado’s best friend! Use it to wrap your exposed avocados to keep them fresh 3x longer than foil. I love this when I want to throw some Avocados From Mexico on my scrambled eggs or my lunchtime salad to add good fats to my meal.
Taco Night is a fun night by nature, so we spread out in an assembly line fashion and started tossing the GladWare containers full of our taco toppings down the line to the kitchen table. Luckily, Glad Press’n Seal works to keep food fresh and secure because my boys definitely dropped a couple of the containers along the way. But, thanks to Glad nothing broke open or busted out.
The kitchen table is never as colorful as when it is Taco Bar Night! We have containers of cheese, lettuce, guacamole made fresh from our avocados from Mexico, sour cream, roasted corn, onions, cilantro, and three different kinds of salsa. Some nights I change out the meats and serve up chicken or carne asada, refried beans, and Mexican rice.
How to Make Taco Meat Recipe
- Start off by placing a large skillet over medium-high heat on your stovetop.
- Once the pan is hot, go ahead and add your ground beef to the pan, Use a wooden spoon to break up the meat as it cooks. Keep cooking the meat until it’s no longer pink.
- Next, you’ll drain off any excess fat that’s rendered from the meat while cooking. Then return the pan to the burner and reduce the heat to medium.
- Now you’ll pour in the tomato sauce and stir it into the ground beef. Add in all of the seasonings and stir them into the meat and sauce.
- After that, bring the skillet to a simmer and allow your taco meat to cook for about 5 minutes.
- Once your taco meat is finished cooking, transfer it to a serving bowl and serve it warm with your favorite taco toppings.
Do you add water to taco meat?
Once your ground beef is cooked, you’ll add some sort of liquid to the meat along with your spices. You can use water, or even tomato sauce (like I did) for some more flavor. Beef broth or vegetable broth would be good options too.
Even the store-bought taco seasoning packets have you add some water into the mix. But let me tell you, homemade taco seasoning is so easy you can just skip the packets.
Every member of my family loves tacos, but we all love our tacos prepared in different ways. Our oldest always puts the cheese on first so it gets melty underneath his warm, seasoned shredded chicken or taco meat. Our youngest will not touch a taco with onion or cilantro on it. My husband loves a Southwest style taco with roasted corn and sour cream. I love it all, so I like to build a couple of different tacos so I can get a little bit of everything that I love.
When all was said and done, we were all satisfied with our creations and we had a ton of leftovers. The best part of using Gladware and Glad Press’n Seal is that all of our taco night leftovers were already packed and ready for the fridge which is a blessing after any family dinner.
We just rebuilt the assembly line from the table directly to the fridge and everything was put away in a flash. Taco Bar Night is even more amazing when it turns into a stress-free, pre-prepped Taco Bar lunch the next day. Glad Press’n Seal kept our leftovers fresh and ready for round two because who would not want to eat delicious tacos two days in a row?
I’ve even used leftover taco meat for recipes throughout the week. I love adding it to quesadillas or spooning some on top of a southwestern kale salad. It’s so good and makes lunches SUPER easy. You can even use leftover taco meat to make this Ground Beef Taco Dip over the weekend if you haven’t used it all up yet.
Glad® Press’n Seal® and Avocados From Mexico are available for pickup through Walmart Online Grocery Pickup!
Ingredients
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 15 ounces tomato sauce
- 2 tablespoons ground cumin
- 2 tablespoons ground coriander
- 2 tablespoons garlic powder
- 2 tablespoons onion powder
- 1 tablespoon Mexican oregano (regular oregano is fine too)
- 2 teaspoons smoked paprika
- 1 teaspoon salt (or more to taste)
- 1 teaspoon pepper (or more to taste)
- ½ teaspoon chili powder (or more to taste)
Instructions
- Brown ground beef in a large skillet on medium-high high heat until cooked through, about 8 minutes.
- Drain off any fat from meat and place skillet back on the heat. Turn stove down to medium heat.
- Stir in tomato sauce and all seasonings. Allow to simmer for 5 minutes.
- Serve warm and enjoy with your favorite taco toppings!
Rachael Yerkes says
This is seriously amazing. Thank you for sharing. Loved having a taco bar for cinco de mayo!
Aubrey Cota says
Thanks so much, Rachael! 🙂