Forget the drive-thru, this ground beef taco recipe tastes just like the hard shell Taco Bell tacos you love! It’s a fast recipe that makes for an easy taco dinner at home any night of the week.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
“Fabulous change-up to plain old beef tacos! I was a bit leery at the addition of cornmeal, but hubby thought it sounded interesting, so we tried it. Not only does it make your pound of ground beef stretch farther, it was filling & adds a great consistency to ordinary, crumbly beef taco meat. This will be a go-to going forward!” -Valerie, FoodieCrush reader
These Hard Shell Beef Tacos Taste BETTER Than Taco Bell
These ground beef tacos are a nod to one of America’s favorite Mexican fast food chains (and my husband’s) — Taco Bell.
I’m not much of a fast food fan, but Taco Bell tacos hit just right when it comes to drive-thru Mexican food. I have many recipes that satisfy our regular taco cravings, like my blackened fish tacos with creamy avocado sauce, carnitas, and grilled steak tacos.
But these Taco Bell tribute tacos are so nostalgic and satisfy a totally different type of craving, right up there with greasy, cheesy pepperoni pizza. This recipe comes from my mother-in-law. She shared all her secrets with me, and these are so good, they could very well curb your drive-thru habit too.
Enjoy!
Heidi’s Tips for Recipe Success
Select ground beef that isn’t too lean. 85% lean ground beef is perfect for making tacos. You don’t want anything too lean, otherwise, you’re liable to wind up with dry taco meat.
Ditch the taco seasoning packet and make your own. Fortunes have been made on packaging taco seasoning, but it’s so simple to make from your spice drawer using just ground cumin, chili powder, garlic salt, kosher salt, and black pepper. Taco seasoning is pretty salty by itself, so don’t be alarmed if you take a taste and feel it’s too much.
Yellow cornmeal is the secret ingredient that makes these tacos taste just like Taco Bell’s! my mother-in-law swears this is key to making these tacos taste most like Taco Bell. Cornmeal tightens up the beef mixture after the tomato juice is added and adds another layer of maize/corn essence, combining with the Mexican flavors.
What’s in This Recipe?
The full recipe, with amounts, can be found in the recipe card below.
- Ground beef — You could substitute ground turkey if you wanted, but you’d need to add a little extra oil since turkey is so lean.
- White onion + garlic — Get sautéed with the ground beef mixture for more flavor.
- Tomato juice — This surprise ingredient is added to the ground beef and spices to deglaze the pan. It loosens up all those browned bits and also lends extra moisture for the perfect consistency. You could also use V-8 or water.
- Yellow cornmeal — If the taco meat feels too thick after stirring in the cornmeal, add a bit more tomato juice to thin it and cook the cornmeal.
- Taco shells — I like hard taco shells (white corn specifically), but yellow corn or even flour tortillas make a great Taco Bell-style taco.
- Shredded cheese – Cheddar cheese is my cheese of choice. Shred your own (I don’t recommend buying the pre-shredded stuff, which doesn’t melt as well).
- Taco seasoning — Homemade taco seasoning is easy to make with just cumin, chili powder, garlic salt, kosher salt, and black pepper.
Love tacos? Try making this 30-minute taco soup recipe next. It’s packed with the flavor of your favorite tacos, all cooked in one pot!
How to Make Beef Tacos Like Taco Bell
- Cook the ground beef. I recommend using a flat-edged wooded spatula to really chop up the beef into small pieces. I find this easiest to do once the meat has begun to brown, breaking down easier than when raw. My MIL says the flavor in these tacos comes from browning the beef thoroughly, building crisped bits on the bottom of the pan. Watch it though, so the beef doesn’t burn or char.
Heidi’s Tip: To break down the taco meat very finely, use a potato masher or a meat masher. Or, use your spatula and take your time breaking up the ground beef.
- Sauté the onion and garlic. Once the meat is in smaller bits, stir in the onions and garlic and cook.
- Add the special seasonings. Adding the taco spices to the ground beef toward the end of browning allows them to cook for a minute or two to seal flavor into the meat and also awakens the flavors of the spices as they heat.
- Simmer to thicken. After stirring in the tomato juice and cornmeal, let the taco filling bubble away for 10 to 15 minutes. If you try to serve your ground beef tacos immediately, the filling will be too soupy.
- Toast your tacos. Use a sheet pan or a casserole dish to snuggle your corn tortillas together upright, then spoon the taco meat into them and sprinkle them with shredded cheese. Toast in the oven or a toaster oven at 400°F just until the cheese melts and the shells begin to brown.
- Set up a DIY area for filling your tacos. Make your life easier and put all the taco toppings into serving dishes for folks to top their tacos how they’d like.
Our Favorite Taco Toppings
Sour cream, shredded iceberg lettuce, avocado, diced tomatoes, and onion are my picks for classic toppings. Everyone has their favorite toppings, and since you’re making them yourself, now is the time to load them up.
Here are some more suggestions:
- Red onion or pickled onions
- Cilantro
- Pico de gallo
- Avocado salsa verde
- Restaurant-style salsa
- Pickled jalapeños
If you make this recipe, please let me know! Leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating on this recipe below and leave a comment, take a photo and tag me on Instagram with #foodiecrusheats.
Copycat Taco Bell Beef Tacos
Ingredients
- 1 pound 85% lean ground beef
- ½ white onion , diced
- 2 cloves garlic , pressed or minced
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 2 teaspoons chili powder
- 1 teaspoons garlic salt
- 1 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoons pepper
- 2 cups tomato juice
- ¼ cup yellow cornmeal
- 12 taco shells
- 2 cups cheddar cheese , shredded
Optional Toppings:
- sliced lettuce
- chopped tomatoes
- avocado
- onion
- sour cream
Instructions
- Add the ground beef to a large skillet over medium-high heat and cook until browned, about 10 minutes, breaking into small pieces as it browns.
- Add the onion and garlic and sauté until the beef is well browned and the onion is translucent.
- Add the cumin, chili powder, garlic salt, kosher salt, and black pepper and cook for another 1-2 minutes, stirring often.
- Stir in the tomato juice and cornmeal and simmer for 10-15 minutes or until the juice has cooked down and the cornmeal softens, stirring occasionally. Add more tomato juice or water if the mixture clumps.
- Place the taco shells on a sheet pan or in a baking dish and spoon about ⅓ cup taco meat into each shell and sprinkle with cheddar cheese. Broil in a toaster oven or oven until the cheese melts.
- Garnish the tacos with fixings and serve.
Notes
Nutrition
FAQs
You could drain your ground beef if you wanted but I don’t usually bother.
Some recipes have you do this, but tomato juice imparts so much more flavor! However, if your mix is too thick, you can use water to thin it out.
You can, but your homemade taco recipe won’t taste just like Taco Bell’s.
What to Serve With Hard Shell Tacos
More Taco Recipes You’ll Want to Make
We send good emails. Subscribe to FoodieCrush and have each post plus exclusive content only for our subscribers delivered straight to your e-mail box.
Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest for more FoodieCrush inspiration.
As always, thank you for reading and supporting companies I partner with, which allows me to create more unique content and recipes for you. There are affiliate links in this post of which I receive a small commission. All opinions are always my own.
A Santos
Taste of my childhood. I grew up eating soft tacos from Taco Bell. This recipe is a winner. Now all I need is to find cinnamon twists to go with it.
hahahah I love the cinnamon twist addition :) Glad you like them!
Dale Freeman
could not get off the toilet after that but it was worth it
Ok Dale, a little TMI but glad you liked it hhahahahaha
David
holy guacamole best taco recipe ive had so far
I’m glad you enjoyed David!
Zicri Sanchez
This is IDENTICAL to Taco Bell! The only tweaks I made were to cut the amount of cumin in half, and I to put the cooked meat with onion and garlic into the food processor before putting it back in the pan to add the spices. (To get that Taco Bell texture just right). I prefer the soft taco route, and the closest store tortillas to the Taco Bell ones are the Mission “Super Soft” Fajita Tortillas. Just wrap in a damp paper towel and microwave for 15 seconds. So glad I found this recipe! I’m currently pregnant and always craving Taco Bell. I can now enjoy it as often as I want, guilt free.
Ha! I’m so glad you agree Zicri and are a fellow Taco Bell lover :)
Beth
I was a little skeptical with the corn meal, but went ahead and it was great! So glad. Will make it again.
Hayley
We’re so happy you enjoyed these, Beth!
Nicholas
this taste like a sloppy joe..it would be good for that but as a taco..its horrible
Hayley
We’re sorry to hear you weren’t a fan, Nicholas. We appreciate you giving the recipe a try.
Chester Borland
Fry your own shells!
Yes, you certainly could!
Kait
This has become a fav in my house because it’s almost as easy as getting Taco Bell but I can make it 100% gluten-free. I can also use it for a few meals – I put maybe 1/4c meat per taco + hella fixins in 3-4 tacos for me and my husband, and still have leftover beef for nachos, etc. the next day. One thing I’ve noticed is that tomato juice is harder/more expensive to find in stores near me, but you can make it with 1 part tomato sauce (almost 1 little can for this recipe) and 1 part water. Thanks for the great copycat! ❤️
beth
same here
Judy Parrott
can I make this a day ahead and refrigerate?
What would be best way to reheat?
Hayley
Hi Judy! You can definitely make the taco meat a day ahead and refrigerate, then gently reheat in a skillet over low heat (might want to add a bit of water to it). Then assemble the tacos. We hope you enjoy!
Troy
Looks good, but do you drain the grease off the meat at any time, or just leave it as is?
Ashley @ Foodie Crush
Sounds great! I would say 4 servings
Jen
That was awesome! Totally tastes and has the same mouth feel as a taco bell taco!! Thank you! You made my son really happy! :). (And the rest of us). We’ll definitely do this again and again!
Ashley @ Foodie Crush
Thank you so much!
Kae
Hi-the 2 cups of tomato juice, that is 16 oz, correct? Wanted to make these next few days, and 16 oz seems a bit of a large quantity. Thanks you for the recipe. Will try for sure.
Kae
Hi-what type or brand taco shells do you use. I’ve tried different brand and most are decent but have not found one that tastes good. Taco Bell shells are good, but the ones they sell in stores are not the same recipe of what they sell in restaurants.
Any recommendations? Thank you for the recipe.
I like white corn tortillas the best, but really, I haven’t been too particular about it.
Rachel
I’ve been making tacos since I was a kid and have tweaked my own recipe several times over the years, can’t wait to try out this recipe! After reading the recipe it sounds amazing and I’m eager to see how they compare with my own. My question is my husband and I actually prefer a soft flour shell and I was wondering if you would recommend the baking process with these or just prewarm the shells as I do now?
Ashley @ Foodie Crush
Thanks Rachel!! I can’t wait to hear. I just pre warm them a little
Tom
what brand of taco shells do you recommend?
Situ
Yum! Gonna make a veggie version this. Do you think cornmeal will be needed if we use tofu or soy crumbles instead of beef?
Ashley @ Foodie Crush
Yes Situ! I would still use the cornmeal with Tofu
Awesome Situ. I haven’t tried it with meat substitutes so I can’t say for sure, but in my head I am thinking it would work just fine and add even more flavor because of the low flavor of meat substitutes. Let us know how it works!
Holly
We used this recipe with soy meat and it was so good! We also used vegan cheese and they still tasted just like taco bell tacos. Thank you!
Meliza
Made these tonight – my husband couldn’t get over how good they were! Definitely a repeat!
Hofterzielbeek
I’m dying to eat some Mexican food. Surely gonna try it today. Thanks for the recipe.
Hope you give them a try!
Jeannie
Can’t wait to try this. Can you share your MIL’s recipe for hamburger soup also? Thanks…..love your blog.
Thanks Jeannie, I added the link where I mentioned it at the top of the post. Hope you give it a try.
Connie Hoffman
Ha. That doesn’t look like anything that Taco Bell has. Looks a million times better. Looks more like Taco John’s.
Ha! Thanks Connie, they’re just as addicting though. My daughter ate 5 of them the other day!
MarianneB
Thanks, they look easy and delicious! But, I do have a quick question please—-what kind of knife is that is the photo with the onions? Is that an illusion in the photo or is there some kind of indentation that follows the curve of the blade? I’ve never seen anything like it. If it is in the design, to what purpose? Thanks for your time.
Thank you Marianne! The knife is an 8″ Pro Chef’s Knife from Zwilling. I suppose the ridge is there so the food doesn’t stack when chopped? I love all of the Zwilling knives!
Reagan
We love an easy taco night at our house so I will be trying these soon!
I think you’ll love them too Reagan. Thanks for the comment.
Sabrina
would never have guessed that secret ingredient and cooking tweak, de-glaze and extra baking, I’ve always wanted to know how T Bell tacos were made, so thank you for cracking the code
Thanks Sabrina, and while this may not be the exact Taco Bell recipe, they sure taste a lot like them. Hope you give them a try :) p.s. baking the shells with the cheese and meat makes them extra delish.