baked tacos

So right now, my life is super focused on work and pricing out the house that we want to build. It’s exciting and draining.

We really like the community that we are looking into and the house too. We’ve been hooked since we walked into the model of it a a different community. And even then we looked at hundreds of plans from other builders and are still hooked on it. The big struggle now is figuring out the finishes we want to upgrade. Well, I should clarify, we have our wishlist and now we are purging through to get to the finishes that we can’t live without and the ones that financially/logistically make sense to have in the house when we move in vs do on our own later on.

Flooring is the hardest part since…

1) we don’t want carpet for the look, cleanliness, and allergens

2) upgrading flooring from carpet to tile or hardwoods is $$$.

So we have basically given up and are opting for standard carpet in the bedrooms and in some rooms on the first floor. We’d love to tile the whole first floor and have hardwoods on the 2nd but our bank account says otherwise.

At this point we are working though another round of edits to get a better idea of what the house will come to and go from there. I am hoping to figure it out soon since building is a 6 month process and I really wanted to be in the house by Christmas. But, we’ll see how it all works out.

 

  

Anyway it’s Tuesday so I have another Taco Tuesday post for ya.

It’s super special. It’s super cheesy.

While I am normally all about soft tacos, I had been craving hard tacos recently. So I just figured I would make them extra crunchy by baking them. And, of course, it just made sense to load them up with cheese that would get extra awesome in the oven when it melted. Yasss!!

Extra Cheesy Baked Tacos

Makes 10 tacos

Ingredients

• 1 pound ground turkey or beef
• 2-3 Tablespoons taco seasoning
• 1/2 Cup water
• 1/4 Cup fresh chopped cilantro
• 4 ounce can diced green chilies
• 2 Cups shredded cheese, I suggest a ‘Mexican Style’ blend
• 10 flat bottom hard taco shells
• Toppings, such as diced tomatoes, sour cream, chopped green onions, olives

Process

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Over medium heat, in a large skillet, break up the meat while browning. When it has been just browned, but not cooked through, add the taco seasoning, water, cilantro, and chilies. Turn down and simmer on low until most of the water has been absorbed.
3. Arrange the taco shells in a 13 x 9 baking pan, sprinkle 1 cup of the cheese in the bottom of all of the taco shells. Bake for 2-3 minutes, just until the cheese has begun to melt.
4. Evenly distribute the meat into the taco shells. Try to leave excess liquid in the pan to prevent the taco shells from getting soggy.
5. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese and return to the oven for another 2-3 minutes, or until the cheese has melted.
6. Top with your favorite toppings and enjoy!