- Recipe
- Weeknight
- Meal planning
Taco Friday with Homemade Taco Seasoning
Swedish-style beef tacos with a taco seasoning you mix yourself in two minutes. Plus how much you need for four and what to do with the leftovers on Saturday.
Samla4 min read
Friday's easiest dinner
In Sweden, Friday means tacos. It is the dinner nobody has to decide on: the mince takes a quarter of an hour, the rest is chopping vegetables and setting out bowls. Everyone builds their own, so the picky eater and the hungry one are happy at the same table.
The only thing we change from the standard version is the seasoning. Packet taco seasoning often has salt, sugar and starch mixed in with the spices. Mix your own and you control the salt and the heat, and it tastes of cumin and chilli rather than of the packet.
Ingredients
Taco seasoning
- mild chilli powder
- ground cumin
- smoked paprika
- garlic powder
- onion powder
- dried oregano
- salt
- cayenne pepper, more if you like it hot
- cornflour
The mince
- beef mince
- onion, finely chopped
- oil
- water
- tomato purée
For the table
- tortillas or taco shells
- iceberg lettuce, shredded
- tomatoes, diced
- cucumber, diced
- sweetcorn, drained
- grated cheese
- sour cream
- jar taco sauce or salsa
- avocado, sliced
Method
- Mix all the seasoning spices in a small bowl.
- Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Soften the onion for 3–4 minutes.
- Turn up the heat and add the mince. Fry and break it up until browned and the liquid has cooked off, about 6 minutes.
- Stir in the tomato purée and the seasoning and fry for another minute so the spices sizzle.
- Pour in the water and simmer for 5 minutes until the sauce thickens and turns glossy. Season with salt.
- Warm the tortillas in a dry pan or the oven and set everything out in bowls.
Make the seasoning by the jar
Quadruple the mix and keep it in an airtight jar. That covers four Fridays, and it keeps for months in a dark cupboard. The cornflour can stay in the blend; all it does is thicken the sauce.
Six ways to take your tacos to the next level
- Toast the spices. Let the seasoning sizzle in the fat for a full minute before the water goes in. Cumin and chilli taste twice as strong once they have had some heat.
- Quick-pickled red onion. Slice a red onion thinly and cover with 50 ml vinegar, 100 ml water, 1 tbsp sugar and a pinch of salt. After fifteen minutes it is pink, sharp and cuts through everything rich.
- Chipotle in the sour cream. Stir a chopped chipotle in adobo, or 1/2 tsp smoked paprika and a squeeze of lime, into the sour cream. Smoky and hot instead of just cold.
- Brown the mince properly. Fry it in two batches if your pan is small. Grey, steamed mince never tastes as good as mince with a crust.
- Warm the tortillas in a dry pan. 20 seconds a side until they get brown spots. Wrap them in a tea towel and they stay warm and soft.
- Finish with acid and something fresh. Lime over the mince just before serving, and fresh coriander on the table for whoever wants it.
How much do you need for four?
Allow 125 g of mince per person. With lettuce, sweetcorn and cheese on the table, 500 g feeds four adults, or two adults and three children. Tortillas go faster than you expect: two or three each.
The quantities are exactly what gets forgotten at the shop. Put the recipe in the week's plan and everything lands on the shopping list, sorted by aisle.
Vegetarian taco Friday
Swap the mince for 1 can of black beans and 100 ml red lentils. Simmer the lentils in the water for 10 minutes before the beans and seasoning go in. Soy mince works as a straight swap too, with a little more oil.
Leftovers on Saturday
If there is mince left over, and there nearly always is, it makes a taco pie. Press out a pastry base, fill it with the mince, top with sour cream, egg and cheese whisked together, and bake at 200°C for 25 minutes. The leftover vegetables become the salad on the side.
