Hard Shell Oven Tacos

I am the shortcut queen when it comes to making dinner.  I like to save time and energy just as much as the next gal but at the same time, I don't want to sacrifice taste or quality.  

My kids love tacos.  Not the gourmet, sliced skirt steak with fresh pico de gallo kind of tacos - I'm talking about the hard shell, ground beef kind of tacos.  I can't say that I share their admiration for this kind of tacos but every once in a while I make them, just because they love it.  

I shouldn't really complain about their taco love because it's a super simple dinner.  I buy a box of taco shells, a pound of ground beef (sometimes I secretly swap it out for turkey) and a packet of taco seasoning.  What could be simpler?  

A few years ago, while I was frying up my ground beef I happened to turn my seasoning packet over and read the list of ingredients.  I was shocked!  First of all, it was LOADED with sodium and even worse than that is that it had MONO-SODIUM GLUTAMATE!  MSG, really?  They can still sell that stuff?

I thought maybe it was my brand of seasoning so I went back to the grocery store in search of an MSG-free taco seasoning packet.  I couldn't find one!  This was alarming.

​​I am not comfortable serving MSG to my family so I had to find another way to season the ground beef tacos for my kids.  I started making my own taco seasoning years ago.  It's really pretty easy and it tastes even better than the store bought seasoning packets.  I attached a recipe for homemade taco seasoning at the end of the this blog post.

Hard Shell Oven Tacos
2 lbs ground turkey
1 small onion diced
1 small can diced green chilies
1 recipe for Homemade taco seasoning (below)
1 (8 ounce) can low sodium tomato sauce 
1 (16 ounce) can fat free refried beans 
2 cups shredded reduced fat Colby-jack cheese 
18-20 hard taco shells

Taco Seasoning
1 tablespoon chili powder
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon black pepper

In a small bowl, mix together seasoning ingredients. 

In a large skillet brown ground beef and onion over medium-high heat.

​Drain off any excess liquid. Return to pan, add chilies, refried beans, tomato sauce, and taco seasoning.

Spoon the taco meat mixture into the taco shells and place into a 9 x 13 inch baking dish standing up.

Sprinkle cheese over the top of the taco meat in each shell.

Place into the oven and bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 minutes or until the cheese has melted and the tacos are heated through. 

We like pretty simple toppings on our tacos.  (lettuce, salsa and on rare occasions - black olives.)

​Courtney said that these tacos tasted just like the mini tacos that we get from trader joes.  (I'm 99% sure that she meant that as a compliment.)  Anyway, I thought they were super tasty. 

Ciao! 

Click here for a printable version of this recipe