Summer Taco Salad
This is a super easy and super yummy recipe I got from my wonderful step mother back home in Texas.
She’s shared a lot of really neat recipes with me over the years and while I don’t have her skill when it comes to making the absolute best crispy fried chicken (the secret is self-rising flour, I hear) – I have lovingly prepared and made lovers of a number of her awesome recipes.
I remember the first time I ever had Summer Taco Salad – I was pretty young, we’d been swimming in the pool all day and S came out on the back porch and loaded up the picnic table with plates and bowls full of delicious offerings. I was sun burned. It was hot. She always had lots of soda in the fridge, something I wasn’t real used to.
Summer Taco Salad brings all those memories of summertime in Texas flooding back. The swimming, the lake, the fun. I hope you enjoy it too.
See how hot it is? The dressing is sweating!
Your Grocery list:
- 1 pound of ground meat – I’ve made it with beef (my step mom makes it with beef) and I’ve made it with turkey. I prefer turkey.
- 2 – 15 oz. cans of Ranch Style Beans
- 1 – 16 oz package of grated cheddar or Mexican style cheese
- 1 bag of Corn Chips
- Lettuce – I chop and mix iceberg and hearts of romaine
- 1 – 16 oz. bottle of Catalina Dressing
- 2-4 Roma tomatoes
Because this is a meal that is served cold, you’ll need to do some pre-planning. I like to get all my stuff ‘ready-to-mix’ the day before we plan to eat it, then just pop it in the fridge overnight.
Brown/Cook your ground meat until it’s done. If you use ground beef drain and rinse away the fat with hot water. You’ll want to let the meat sit in your colander for a bit, so that all the water and fat drains away. If you use ground turkey, there shouldn’t be any fat in the skillet, so it shouldn’t require draining and rinsing. Put the browned meat in a bowl with a lid and place it in the refrigerator, until cold.
Brow...uh...Cooked ground turkey
Open your two cans of Ranch Style Beans and pour them into a colander. Rinse away the sauce then let the water drain before putting them in a bowl with a lid and placing in the refrigerator, until cold.
Rinsed and drained Ranch Style Beans
Next you’ll dice your tomatoes, chop your lettuce and prepare any additional ingredients you might want to add.
Diced Roma Tomatoes
Chopped iceberg and romaine lettuce
Now that you’ve had your ingredients in the refrigerator and they’re cold and ready to go – we can now do the easiest step of all, mix it together.
In a bowl combine your meat, beans, cheese and tomatoes then mix them together gently. Once they appear to be mixed up well, you can add the Catalina dressing to your liking. Some prefer a lot of dressing, while others prefer much less. I’m some place in the middle.
I serve the meat/bean mixture over a bead of lettuce, with a small handful of corn chips. I also sprinkle the top with cheese and add black olives, because I love them.
The actual recipe calls for mixing everything together in a bowl and covering it with Catalina, but I don’t do that, because I prefer my corn chips to stay crunchy and it also seems like it wilts the lettuce much faster. There is also way more here than the three of us can eat in one meal, so if I mixed it all together, it wouldn’t save for later.
Summer Taco Salad
It looks pink and kind of funny – but it really is delicious. I hope you’ll give it a try and come back and tell me what you think.
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
We make this in the summer too. I need to do it again soon. My kids love it with lots of black olives and sometimes cheese squares instead of grated cheese. I put the dressing on the side, some kids don’t like it and one likes to add salsa. I use canned pinto beans instead of ranch style cause my kids don’t like the ranch flavor. I also occasionally sneak extra stuff in there, like corn, or extra beans, grated carrots etc.
Forgot to mention, one kid puts Ranch dressing on hers.
nom nom nom!! Totally making this soon!! I don’t know why but I’ve been totally into salads lately. I wish I could go to Panera Bread or Wendy’s and even McD’s every day just to get a stupid salad. I made a yummy one tonight: boston lettuce, apple, dried cranberries, glazed pecans, scallions, shredded cheddar and a chopped grilled chicken breast with Kraft’s raspberry vinaigrette. It’s nothing I would normally put together, and I would NEVER buy that salad dressing but everything goes so well together. I have to thank a friend who made it for me because as I said I would never had tried it otherwise.
That looks delish! Love all the colorful pictures!