A few months ago, I stumbled upon this recipe for fried tacos on Pinterest and immediately thought they’d be great for car camping. You can stuff them with any filling you like, but our favorites are beans and pepper jack cheese, sweet potato and black beans, and soyrizo with potatoes. These are easy and fun to throw together. We’ve provided some guidelines, rather than a recipe, so feel free to scale this to create more than 12 tacos. If you are cooking for a crowd, it’s great if you can round up a couple of helpers so ideally one person can warm tortillas, another can assemble tacos, and another can fry. Let us know what taco filling combinations you try!
Skillet Fried Tacos
Yield
12 servingsPrep Time / Cook Time
/Activity Guide
Car CampingIngredients
- 12 corn tortillas
- 1/4 cup oil
- About 4 cups filling of your choice (some of our favorites are beans + cheese, sweet potato + beans, soyrizo + potato)
- Course salt
- Hot sauce (optional)
Tools
- Campfire or grill
- Cast iron skillet
- Cutting board
- Foil
- Knife
- Skillet
- Tongs
Method
- Warm the tortillas until they’re pliable in a small skillet or over the campfire. Keep them warm by wrapping them in a tea towel or some foil.
- Assemble the tacos by placing some filling inside each tortilla and folding the tortillas over to form a taco.
- Heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a cast iron skillet. Working in batches, place a few tacos in the skillet and fry on each side until the fillings are heated through and the tortillas are crunchy.
- When they’re cooked through, place them on a paper towel lined plate, sprinkle with salt and hot sauce. Serve immediately.
Those look amazing! I’d try it with some pulled BBQ pork and red cabbage slaw! Or even do a breakfast taco with eggs, avocado and sauteed veggies.
Thanks KellyAnn! Those versions both sound delicious as well. We’d love to see pictures on Facebook if you end up making some!
How do you pre cook your sweet potato for taco filling? It sounds delicious but I haven’t tried it yet
Yes, maybe we should have been more clear on that part, Jenny. Sorry! We chop the sweet potatoes (or regular potatoes) into very small cubes, and saute them with a little olive oil until they get tender. You can speed the process up by adding water after they brown a bit and cover to steam for a few minutes. Then add your beans and cook until heated through.
Hi there! Can’t wait to try these on our vacation in a few weeks. I was wondering, what heat level do I use when frying the tacos? Thanks!
Sandy, sorry we took so long to respond! If you’re using a gas stove, medium-high is a good place to start. You can test it out with a few tortilla triangles (which will become a great appetizer!). The heat will need adjusting as you cook, though, because tacos will cool the oil a bit. Good luck!
How to make tacos with putting meat in them raw and then frying
Hi Shirley! That is a great question. If you are using meat such as ground beef, I recommend cooking it separately before assembling tacos. The frying of the tacos makes the contents hot and the tortilla crispy. The cooking of meat would require a longer frying time, which would probably lead to burnt tortillas.