Dinner

Easy Cheesy Beef Taco Cups

Everything you love about taco night, baked into a crispy little cup you can pick up with your hands. Small flour tortillas get pressed into a muffin tin and baked into sturdy shells, then filled with lean ground beef and sweet onion browned in the skillet and simmered in taco seasoning, buried under cheddar, and baked again until the cheese melts down and turns golden at the edges. Cool sour cream, juicy diced tomato, and crunchy shredded lettuce go on at the table. Three cups make a serving — and roughly 38 grams of protein.

▶Watch the original reel

Ingredients

• 12 small flour tortillas (fajita size)
• 1 lb lean ground beef (90/10)
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 packet taco seasoning (about 3 Tbsp)
• ¼ cup water
• 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
• ½ cup sour cream
• 1 cup diced tomato (about 1 large tomato)
• 1 cup shredded iceberg lettuce (est.)

Steps

1. Crisp the shells: Heat the oven to 375°F. Spray a 12-cup muffin tin with cooking spray. Press one tortilla into each cup, folding and pleating the edges so each one forms a little bowl. Bake about 5 minutes, until the shells hold their shape and start to crisp. Leave them in the tin.
2. Brown the beef: While the shells bake, set a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the ground beef, break it apart, and cook, stirring, until it goes from pink to deeply browned, 6 to 8 minutes. Tip in the onion from its bowl and cook 2 to 3 minutes more, until soft. Drain any excess fat.
3. Season: Sprinkle the taco seasoning over the beef, pour in the ¼ cup water, and stir. Simmer 2 to 3 minutes, until the sauce thickens and coats the beef.
4. Fill the cups: Spoon the hot beef straight from the skillet into all 12 shells, then cover each one with shredded cheddar.
5. Bake until melted: Return the tin to the oven for 10 to 12 minutes, until the cheddar is fully melted and lightly golden and the shell edges are crisp. Let the cups stand 2 minutes.
6. Top and serve: Lift the cups out of the tin and set them on a platter. Dollop each one with sour cream, then add the diced tomato and shredded lettuce. Serve right away, three cups to a plate.

Recipe adapted from Ground Beef Recipes’ Easy Cheesy Beef Taco Cups (Facebook Page) — original reel. Her linked written recipe (recipesown.com) gives the method and most amounts; her printable card lists wonton wrappers, but her reel and article build the cups from tortillas pressed into a muffin tin, so we follow the reel. The shredded-lettuce amount and the ¼ cup of water are our estimates, and the macros are estimates computed from the ingredient list (a pound of lean 90/10 beef, a cup of cheddar, and three small flour tortillas per serving).