Tacos de Lengua

Last week was a little rough. I was really tired all week. I even took naps a few days. It just seemed like no matter what I did, I couldn't get enough sleep. Then Thursday hit and I got the most intense craving for beef tongue. Yeah, I know. Very random thing to crave! But to be fair, my first experience with beef tongue came from Joseph Decuis and it was Wagyu beef. It was amazing. Before I lose you completely, here's the final product-it looks a little more appetizing than the raw meat  :)

Between the exhaustion and the craving for offal, I figured I had to be a little anemic. So I started my search for beef tongue. It turned out to be a lot harder to find than I thought. I called several butchers, but no one had it. My favorite place to buy meat from wouldn't have it until this week, but I couldn't wait that long. I finally found a German butcher that had it! At that point, I didn't care they wanted $12/lb. So Saturday afternoon, I put the tongue in a brine and prepared it for Sunday.

After rinsing the brine, here's what I had:

Cooking the tongue is really easy. It only needs onions, beef stock and a crock pot. Start by laying sliced onions in the bottom.

Then the tongue and beef stock. The liquid should cover the tongue, so add a little water if you're short. Then cook on low for 8 hours.

Eight hours later, remove the tongue and let it rest. When it's just cool enough to handle, remove the skin. No one wants to eat that part and that would be a textural nightmare for me!!

Then use 2 forks to shred the meat

Now you have a big bowl of shredded beef tongue.

You can eat it just like this and it's quite tasty. It kind of has the flavor of a prime steak cut, with the texture of shredded pork. We wanted tacos, so I sauteed some red onions and garlic then added some of the shredded meat, along with my seasonings. I used oregano, chili powder, salt, paprika and cumin. Then all that's left is to top with fresh cilantro and enjoy!

I will admit, my husband had absolutely no interest in the tongue when he saw it raw. He really couldn't even look at it. I practically had to force him to try the taco. But when he did, he loved it! In fact, he took leftovers for lunch today-and this is the guy that snubs all leftovers!

Fish Tacos

Fish tacos are something I've been curious about, but had never tried. So when Meijer had tilapia on sale last week, I figured this was the perfect time.

I started out by cooking the fish on the stove in the juice of one lime. At the same time, I heated the tortilla shells in another pan. Now, for the toppings!

I love lime juice on my tacos, so I sliced up one lime in addition to the juice I used to cook the fish in. For the onion, I wanted the flavor, but didn't want it to be overpowering, so I went with green onion. Instead of lettuce, I picked up some arugula. I really like the flavor of arugula and thought it would be perfect with these. Keeping with the unintentional green theme, I chopped up one avocado.

Now, to give them the taco feel, I decided to use a bit of the Philly cooking cream on the shells. I went with the Santa Fe style. Have you guys tried this stuff yet? OMG AMAZING! Love it! The first night I used it, I followed the recipe on the container, but we didn't use all of it. It had just enough spice to give the fish tacos the right flavor without taking over the fish. Here's the finished result:

 

Unfortunately, the husband didn't like them. That's too bad for him; I thought they rocked. I guess next time I make them he'll be eating cereal for dinner. 

Make sure to visit the fantastic blog parties on my sidebar, and of course, link up all your made from scratch recipes on my Tuesday linky-Made From Scratch Tuesday!




This post was also linked to

Taco Bake

One of my favorite time saving techniques in the kitchen is to cook several pounds of ground beef, then freeze it in one pound bags. I usually will do a simple seasoning and measure out into bags. Then I'll do a bag or two with taco seasoning. I'm certainly no "Freeze-o-Rama" mama like Cris over at GOODEness Gracious, but this is one thing I do to save time. We all have those nights where you get home late and the kids are starving. Being able to pull a pound of pre-cooked ground beef out of the freezer can be a life saver, especially when the only other option for a quick dinner is Spaghetti O's. Yuck.

What you'll need:

1 pound of pre-cooked ground beef (I prefer to use the taco seasoned bag)
4 tortillas
1 can refried beans
Salsa (I use my salsa that I canned this year)
Shredded cheese (use as much or as little as you want)
Optional:
Sour cream
Black olives
Your favorite taco toppings

To begin, smother a tortilla with refried beans and put in the bottom of a round, glass baking dish

 

Add some of the pre-cooked ground beef

 

Then spoon on some salsa

 

Sprinkle some shredded cheese over it

 

Repeat this process three times. Bake, covered, at 325 for 30 to 45 minutes.