Tacos, or perhaps more accurately, filled taco shells and flour tortillas

[ElsieD]

I recently decided to start making these.  I had this preconceived notion that I didn't like them but then I had some and realized I was mistaken.  I have had the book 300 Best Tacos on my bookshelf  for I know not how long (or why) and dusted it off.  The first recipe I made was Kalbi tacos with Asian Pear salsa.  They were delicious but I used the marinade on a strip steak rather than short ribs.

 

I'm looking to make more.  Any good taco ideas out there?

[blue_dolphin]

Are you making both corn tortillas and flour tortillas for your tacos? Or are you buying them and looking for filling ideas? 

 

I'm a big fan of breakfast tacos and love using flour tortillas made with bacon fat.  Potato & egg is a great combo.  Chorizo, avocado, eggs and cheese.  Bean, cheese and bacon. 

 

Also, of course, fish tacos, generally with freshly made corn tortillas. 

 

[Shel_B]

Take a look at Tacos Quesabirria.  Here's one idea for it:

 

 

[ElsieD]

1 hour ago, blue_dolphin said:

Are you making both corn tortillas and flour tortillas for your tacos? Or are you buying them and looking for filling ideas? 

 

I'm a big fan of breakfast tacos and love using flour tortillas made with bacon fat.  Potato & egg is a great combo.  Chorizo, avocado, eggs and cheese.  Bean, cheese and bacon. 

 

Also, of course, fish tacos, generally with freshly made corn tortillas. 

 

At the moment, I'm just buying the corn and flour tortillas.  Do you make yours?  I wouldn't mind making them but I would need a tortilla press and I don't want to buy one unless I'm sure I'd use it.  So for now, fillings and toppings.  What do you top your fish tacos with?  I was thinking of a mango/red pepper and maybe cucumber concoction.

[&roid]

I love shrimp tacos - dust the shrimp in seasoned flour then fry to crisp up and just cook. Top with avocado, lettuce, pickled red onions and maybe a lime/sriracha mayo. 

[FrogPrincesse]

2 hours ago, ElsieD said:

What do you top your fish tacos with?  I was thinking of a mango/red pepper and maybe cucumber concoction.

 

The fish taco is San Diego's signature dish, so I feel compelled to respond as a 25+ year resident.   We usually see them topped with salsa fresca, shredded green cabbage, and fresh avocado. A little bit of crema and a squeeze of lime. A dash of hot sauce to your liking (cholula, tapatio). That's it. If you are feeling fancy, finely sliced radishes for extra crunch. Some restaurants make theirs with mango or pineapple salsa which is nice too. At the end of the day, it's really about the fish so everything else is there to highlight rather than cover it. 

[FrogPrincesse]

See this cook-off thread for more taco inspiration.

 

 

[Shel_B]

3 hours ago, ElsieD said:

At the moment, I'm just buying the corn and flour tortillas.  Do you make yours?  I wouldn't mind making them but I would need a tortilla press and I don't want to buy one unless I'm sure I'd use it.  

There's a Salvadoran restaurant near me and they make their tortillas by hand.  They just toss the dough back and forth between their hands.  Sweetie and I got friendly with the ladies there, and they showed us how to do it. It's easy, but it takes some practice.

 

Here's a woman making tortillas without a press, but using a rolling pin instead of just tossing the dough between her hands.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fA68XXQJN4Y

 

Unless you have a physical problem that prevents you from making tortillas without a press, you might want to consider one of these techniques.

 

And here's a review of presses from ATK that might be useful should you decide to go that route:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG_Wrm-qYyI

 

 

 

Edited April 17 by Shel_B (log)

[blue_dolphin]

4 hours ago, ElsieD said:

At the moment, I'm just buying the corn and flour tortillas.  Do you make yours?  I wouldn't mind making them but I would need a tortilla press and I don't want to buy one unless I'm sure I'd use it.

No need to make them if you like what you can buy. In my case, I can buy flour tortillas that I like but have to go out of my way to get great tasting corn tortillas. You don’t need a press for flour tortillas, I’ve always rolled them out with a rolling pin.  A press does make corn tortillas quicker and easier but no need to go there if you like the ones you’ve got. 
 

4 hours ago, ElsieD said:

What do you top your fish tacos with?

Sometimes I go with the classics as @FrogPrincesse described, sometimes I mix it up, using a slaw instead of plain cabbage and if the slaw is spicy, like a kimchi slaw, I might skip the pico de gallo or hot sauce. I aim for something crunchy (cabbage or other veg julienne), something tangy (pico de gallo, pickled onion, hot sauce) and something creamy (crema, avocado)

[Katie Meadow]

For a while we tried making corn tortillas. The presses are inexpensive, so it's worth the experiment. I too have not found a source for good ones. Even making them ourselves, the best ones used fresh masa from a Mexican market rather than the powdered Masa Marina that's easy to come by.

 

So more often we make hybrid fish burritos, since I can get packaged flour tortillas that are pretty good. The topping is pretty much standard: a slaw of regular cabbage with the addition of cilantro and lime juice and my version of crema, which consists of creme fraiche mixed with a little Siggi's yogurt. We used to have a large Mexican supermercado that made their own crema and you could opt for salty or plain. For heat sometimes if I'm lazy I just use Tapatia in it or on the side, but in summer when there are good tomatoes I make a simple fresh salsa for a topping. 

 

In New Orleans I was blown away by the Cajun-Viet crossovers. So for my fish or shrimp burritos I sometimes use a hot cajun blackening seasoning before frying. Or if I'm feeling more like Mexican I marinate the fish in achiote paste before sautéing in butter or oil. I like deep fried fish but I'm too lazy to bother, and now I'm happy with my version.

[blue_dolphin]

@ElsieD, another source of excellent taco ideas would be to search the forums for posts by @C. sapidus that include the word taco and scroll through the list of posts.  He's shared tons of them over the years from delicious looking tacos in the breakfast topic that might feature leftovers as well purpose-built tacos in the Dinner topic and else where that might be traditional Mexican or fusion cuisine! 

[ElsieD]

Thanks everybody.  Lots of suggested reading which I intend to do, I just haven't had time.  I did make fish tacos last night.  Pan-fried panko'd cod, with a pineapple salsa.  Wow, was that good!  Thanks, @blue_dolphin for the suggestion.

Edited April 17 by ElsieD
Fixed a typo (log)

[Senior Sea Kayaker]

I mostly use purchased flour tortillas for breakfast wraps and they are one of my favorite breakfasts.

Another good use would be quesadillas.

I cannot get good corn tortillas in my area as the packaged products available are pretty meh.

 

 

[btbyrd]

Perhaps the best resource I've found is Rick Bayless's "Taco Manual" series on YouTube. I just kind of watch them at random whenever there's a new one posted, but it's really upped my game. Here's the first video in the playlist:

 

 

[btbyrd]

These are tacos filled with creamy poblano peppers, onions, and mushrooms. A hit with my wife, who is mostly vegetarian these days.

 

 

Making your own tortillas is a real game changer. Masienda's masa harina is fantastic and produces tortillas more beautiful and flavorful than Maseca. You can get a fantastic Victoria brand cast iron tortilla press for like $25. I haven't started making flour tortillas yet, but you don't need a press for those. I ordered a small wooden rolling pin in anticipation. There are few things better in life than fresh flour tortillas. Or fresh corn tortillas. Fresh tortillas rock.

[blue_dolphin]

5 hours ago, btbyrd said:

Masienda's masa harina is fantastic and produces tortillas more beautiful and flavorful than Maseca.

Ditto the Masienda masa harina recommendation.  This doesn't help @ElsieD in Canada, but for those in the US, Masienda masa harina is available at Whole Foods.  Most stores have the white and blue.  I've also seen the yellow at my local Whole Foods but not the red.  

Since I'm usually a solo cook and eater, I like that I can easily scale the recipe to make the number of tortillas I want without having to make a big production out of it.  

[ElsieD]

1 hour ago, blue_dolphin said:

Ditto the Masienda masa harina recommendation.  This doesn't help @ElsieD in Canada, but for those in the US, Masienda masa harina is available at Whole Foods.  Most stores have the white and blue.  I've also seen the yellow at my local Whole Foods but not the red.  

Since I'm usually a solo cook and eater, I like that I can easily scale the recipe to make the number of tortillas I want without having to make a big production out of it.  

Actually, there is a Whole Foods here and I just checked them out.  They carry that brand's Heirloom White Coon Massa as well as the Heirloon Blue Corn Massa.

[Shel_B]

There's a woman in Vancouver who has a successful and well-regarded Thai cooking site. I was referencing something on her site today and came across her video about making Thai-style tacos using easy-to-find supermarket ingredient. I immediately thought of you @ElsieD

 

https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/thai-taco/

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EyElhNgsG4

 

Edited April 18 by Shel_B (log)

[Katie Meadow]

13 hours ago, Senior Sea Kayaker said:

I mostly use purchased flour tortillas for breakfast wraps and they are one of my favorite breakfasts.

Another good use would be quesadillas.

I cannot get good corn tortillas in my area as the packaged products available are pretty meh.

 

 

Maybe flour tortillas are more forgiving. Maybe corn tortillas need to be eaten hot off the press!

[Shel_B]

10 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

Maybe flour tortillas are more forgiving. Maybe corn tortillas need to be eaten hot off the press!

To me, the term "more forgiving" means flexible, soft, bendable. Might it be the gluten in flour tortillas that gives them those properties?

[blue_dolphin]

1 hour ago, Shel_B said:

To me, the term "more forgiving" means flexible, soft, bendable. Might it be the gluten in flour tortillas that gives them those properties?

i always thought it was the fat but gluten could well be part of it, too. 

[KennethT]

I'd assume it was the fat as well.

[Katie Meadow]

3 hours ago, Shel_B said:

To me, the term "more forgiving" means flexible, soft, bendable. Might it be the gluten in flour tortillas that gives them those properties?

Maybe. What I was getting at was the fact that, although there's nothing like a fresh warm flour tortilla, they seem more amenable to being reheated on a comal. In NM I was surprised by how delicate the flour tortillas were. I'm so used to TJ's ones that I had forgotten that style.

[Shel_B]

46 minutes ago, KennethT said:

I'd assume it was the fat as well.

I was equating corn tortillas with cornbread or corn muffins in which there's usually ample fat.  After comments here, I checked some corn tortilla recipes and none of them had added fat. Never having made tortillas, this was a learning experience. Thanks!

[KennethT]

27 minutes ago, Shel_B said:

I was equating corn tortillas with cornbread or corn muffins in which there's usually ample fat.  After comments here, I checked some corn tortilla recipes and none of them had added fat. Never having made tortillas, this was a learning experience. Thanks!

Yes, I always thought it was interesting that corn tortillas had no added fat while flour tortillas are traditionally made with lard.  I guess if there was no fat in the flour tortilla it would turn out like matzah!