What’s the holiday season without tacos? I don’t want to know is what. Carolyn Knight, who recently wrote a guest post for the Taco Maven blog, feels the same way. She takes a turn on the Taco Trail. Please welcome Carolyn and try your culinary skills with the appetite-whetting, vegetarian-friendly recipe below. It sure beats the hell out of dried-up bird. Take it away.
It’s been proven that the taco is food perfection. The delicious tortillas make them portable, and the combinations of ingredients you can put inside are endless. OK, so no one has actually shown tacos to be perfect, but they’re the food closest to it from what we can see. With the holidays coming up it might seem like time for a taco break, but they still make for easy meals no matter the time of year.
El Camote
If our Spanish is right (and there’s a good chance it isn’t) we’re talking about sweet potatoes. What says holidays better than this tasty, starchy treat? In most families, you’ll get this holiday dish all sugared up and covered with marshmallows. You can stick that gooey mess into a corn tortilla shell if you want, but we’d rather mix it up a little bit. Our version has a kick and includes a nice corn salsa, to boot.
Salsa ingredients
– 4 cups cooked sweet yellow corn
– 2 tomatoes, diced
– 2 jalapeños, diced
– 1 small red onion, diced
– 1 scallion, diced
– 2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
– 1 lime, juiced
– Chili powder (to taste)
– Salt and pepper (to taste)
Sweet potato ingredients
– 2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed
– 1 tablespoon olive oil
– Salt (to taste)
– Red pepper flakes (to taste)
– 1 lime, juiced
– Corn tortillas
You’ll want to make the salsa first. Mix all the ingredients but the lime together and season to taste. Then juice the lime into the mixture and stick it in the fridge for at least an hour. For the sweet potato mixture, you’ll need to preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Toss all the ingredients in a bowl until the potatoes are nicely coated with the oil and spices. Put the potatoes on a baking sheet (cover it with foil first for easy cleanup), and cook for about 40–45 minutes. You should also stir the potatoes once or twice, so they don’t get stuck and everything cooks evenly. Heat up your tortillas, put the sweet potatoes and corn salsa together, and enjoy!
The Leftovers
What’s the best thing about the holidays? It’s a tossup between spending time with family and food, and leftovers probably tip the scales in favor of food after the festivities are over. They’re great on their own, but what if you used the leftovers for some taco inspiration? Turkey seems to show up a lot in family meals, as do various cranberry dishes. Guess what? These two are the perfect match for a taco feast. Put some leftover turkey in, and smother it in cranberry sauce. Your taste buds will start crying for joy. The possibilities for holiday tacos are only limited by your imagination. Have a taco-filled holiday season!
Carolyn Knight lives in Austin, Texas, where she is a writer for the Blog Content Guild.
The Taco Trail 