Baked Tacos
These cheesy baked tacos are loaded with seasoned ground beef, melted cheese, and crispy shells for an easy, crowd-pleasing family dinner perfect for taco night.
Servings: 5
Calories: 639kcal
Ingredients
- 10 hard stand & stuff taco shells, these are the wide hard corn taco shells with the flat bottoms
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 ½ pounds ground beef, 85%-15% ground round used
- ¾ cup diced yellow onion
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- ¾ cup tomato sauce
- 1 ounce packet taco seasoning
- 1 ½ cups shredded cheddar-jack cheese
- 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh cilantro, optional garnish
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400°F.
- Place the hard taco shells, standing upright, into a 9x13 baking dish being sure not to overcrowd the dish. This will allow the shells to crisp up evenly when baked.
- To a large skillet, over medium-high heat, add the olive oil. Once the oil is hot, add the diced yellow onions, ground beef, salt and black pepper. Cook for 8-10 minutes or until no pink remains. Break up the ground beef while cooking for even browning. Drain off as much of the excess grease as possible before adding the remaining ingredients to the skillet.
- Stir in the tomato sauce and taco seasoning to the cooked ground beef and cook for another 2-3 minutes or until the taco meat has absorbed as much of the sauce as possible without drying out. If your taco filling is too wet when you add it to the taco shells, it can cause the bottoms of the shells to become soggy when baked.
- Fill each of the hard taco shells with approximately ⅓-½ cup of the taco filling. Be sure to divide the filling evenly between each of the hard taco shells.
- Sprinkle the tops of each of the filled taco shells with the shredded cheddar-jack cheese being sure to evenly distribute the cheese between each of the tacos.
- Bake for 5-7 minutes or just until the cheese is melted and the hard taco shells are crispy.
- Remove the baked tacos from the oven and lightly sprinkle the optional garnish of chopped fresh cilantro over the baked tacos before serving.
Notes
- If not using the stand & stuff hard taco shells, you will fit more of the standard hard taco shells in your 9x13 baking dish. Be sure to place them into the baking dish so they are not falling over, but standing upright.
- A family sized box (9.4 ounces) of Old El Paso brand Stand & Stuff hard taco shells contains 20 shells. Making this a great option to easily double the recipe if feeding a larger crowd or if your family eats more than two tacos a serving.
- You can substitute the cheddar-jack cheese with another good melting block cheese such as monterey jack, mild cheddar, colby-jack or spicy pepper jack cheese. Any combination of these cheeses would taste delicious. Be sure to shred by hand a block of your choice of cheese as I find that it melts much smoother than the pre-shredded bagged varieties that contain additional ingredients to prevent clumping.
- You can add your favorite additional taco toppings such as shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, diced avocado or sour cream after removing the baked tacos from the oven and before serving.
- If using a homemade taco seasoning blend, you will need three tablespoons for this recipe.
Nutrition
Calories: 639kcal | Carbohydrates: 22g | Protein: 34g | Fat: 46g | Saturated Fat: 19g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 19g | Trans Fat: 2g | Cholesterol: 127mg | Sodium: 1239mg | Potassium: 590mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 4g | Vitamin A: 962IU | Vitamin C: 6mg | Calcium: 312mg | Iron: 4mg
