It’s Taco Tuesday! Hurray tacos! But wait, you don’t want to drive to the local restaurant, order delivery, and don’t have the taco shells, even though you have everything else, so bummer.
Solution: Make soup. It’s less trouble than cooking everything separately anyway. It’s less time in the kitchen, and you get the taste without the mess. The picky eaters in the fam will eat it too if you throw some toppings, chips or crushed taco shells on it, and maybe give it a fancy name. That’s up to you.
Ideas for soup
Crockpot
You can use a recipe like Paula Deen’s taco soup that takes a minimal amount of time to prepare and it’s in a crockpot, so it can be cooked while you’re at work or while you’re napping or running errands. You could even have a spa day or a girls’ day, and no one would know you played hooky because there’s something good to eat for dinner. Use a crockpot liner, and cut your clean up time to even less.
Stovetop
Find an easy taco soup recipe by typing in a search for one. There are some that take only 30 minutes to cook, and most use only one pan for everything, making clean up a snap. You could also use Paula Deen’s taco soup recipe as a stovetop recipe, but the cooking time will need to be adjusted. With a quick easy recipe like this, there will still be time for fun before you start. You just can’t leave it cooking, because, you know, unwatched pots aren’t a good thing.
Come Up with Your Own
You know what you like. Read some recipes that are out there, like Paula Deen’s taco soup recipe. Take what you like, and mix and match to suit yourself. If you’re a vegetarian or vegan, use meat and dairy substitutes. If you don’t like beef, or your freezer or fridge is fresh out of it, use chicken, pork, or try vegetarian. All offer a change of pace. Vary your toppings, If you or someone in your family doesn’t like cilantro because it tastes like soap to you or them, use something else. Experiment. Have fun! Let the family participate in cooking and cleaning up. It’s a learning experience for you, the kids, roommates, significant others, etc. that don’t know how to cook.
So, if you really don’t want to play delivery roulette and hope the driver can find your house, much less show up on time if at all, wait 30 minutes or more in a crowded restaurant with all the people staring at their smartphones, or inhale car exhaust in a drive-thru, try making some soup. Make it a taco soup. That way, it can always be Tuesday, and you can have your tacos and eat them too, without the frustrations.