Today I’m sharing one of my favorite quick and easy recipes– Mexican Style Ground Beef. It’s the recipe I reach for most often when we’re making ground beef tacos or burritos. It’s full of flavor, saucy, and not much harder than reaching for the taco seasoning.

Mexican Style Ground Beef

If you’re tired of reaching for the Costco-sized container of taco seasoning every time you want Mexican ground beef for tacos, enchiladas, or nachos, you have to try this recipe!

I know I’m guilty of going the easy route, too, but this recipe is really not that much harder than stirring in premade seasoning. It is perfect for a myriad of Mexican ground beef recipes and tastes so much better than anything you can shake out of a canister.

How to Season Mexican Ground Beef

My Mexican style ground beef recipe uses green enchilada sauce, paprika, chili powder, cumin, and dried onion. If you like it on the spicy side, feel free to add a bit of cayenne or ground chipotle chili powder.

Cooking Tips for Restaurant Style Taco Meat

Ever wonder why some taco meat found at restaurants or in chili is ground SUPER fine and how they get it that way? That is the result of actually boiling the hamburger first. This method of cooking brings the temperature of the meat up slowly and prevents it from clumping, keeping it finely ground.

If you’d like to try this method with this recipe, place the beef in a deep pan and add enough cold water to cover the meat. Slowly bring the pan to a boil, stirring often to separate the meat into small crumbles. Once it’s to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer, cover and cook until the meat is brown and fully cooked.

At this point, you’ll drain off the water and add the remaining ingredients to the meat, following the recipe card below.

Other Mexican Inspired Recipes You Might Like

Tools Used In Making This Mexican Style Ground Beef

Lodge 10″ Cast Iron Skillet: Cast Iron Skillets are your BEST friend and are totally underrated. Cast iron retains heat really well and allows you to get that irresistible sear on steaks and other meats you can usually only get at a restaurant. Pair this with the fact that they are CHEAP it’s a no-brainer.
Chop Stir: This strange little tool makes short work of browning ground meat with its odd shape that allows it to crumble the meat quickly as it cooks.

Watch Me Make this Ground Beef Taco Recipe

Ingredients

1 pound lean ground beef
10 ounces green enchilada sauce
2 tablespoons minced dried onion
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon chili powder
Salt to taste

Instructions

Heat a skillet over medium-high heat and brown and crumble ground beef until no longer pink. Drain excess fat.
Return meat to pan and add remaining ingredients, stirring to combine. Let simmer for 5-6 minutes over medium-high heat or until most of the liquid is absorbed and it’s the consistency you like—for instance, I like my taco meat a bit drier than I do for making nachos or enchiladas with.

Nutrition

Nutrition and Food Safety Disclosure

Comments

Alisha Ross says
June 5, 2019 at 9:23 pm

I tried this sauce on turkey meatballs last night and served them to my very picky children and their even pickier cousins. What a HUGE hit! I cannot thank you enough – you’ve added a new staple to their diets …

Moses Brodin says
June 3, 2019 at 5:08 am

Never thought to put roasted tomatoes into a salad, but of course it goes so well with the roasted squash. I added roasted beets since I had some. Don’t have pine nuts; subbed pecans. For the dressing, I didn’t have orange/juice and the stores don’t yet have frozen or fresh cranberries, so I reconstituted dried with hot water. Made my own balsamic dressing with a bit of Dijon mustard. Added strips of grilled tempeh (I’m really not obsessed with protein, but just wanted to use it up).

Victoria Tegg says
May 30, 2019 at 2:18 am

I’ve been loving my crockpot and rice cooker lately for busy weeknights – this recipe is perfect for one of our dinners during the week.

Moses Brodin says
April 18, 2019 at 10:02 pm

I’ve been using ground turkey for years. I personally don’t like the taste of ground beef. Turkey will take the flavor of any seasoning you add and it is much lighter than beef. These meatballs look fantastic. Whenever I’m making spaghetti my guys always want meatballs. Pinning!
Ragerds:Moses Brodin

Moses Brodin says
April 18, 2019 at 1:02 am

I have no kids, but I surely do like cheese 🙂 I do think it’s important, though, to cook with your kids. It’s part of becoming a competent adult.
I have no kids, but I surely do like cheese 🙂 I do think it’s important, though, to cook with your kids. It’s part of becoming a competent adult.

Janet says
February 16, 2019 at 5:27 pm

Finally! The perfect taco recipe. Thank You,

Paul Betts says
February 14, 2019 at 8:47 pm

Great on Nachos!!

Brittnee Winfrey says
September 24, 2018 at 9:28 am

This looks so good! I knew I wanted to do Mexican today, but didn’t have any new ideas. I don’t have green sauce in a can, but have green chilies and alot of spices. I don’t mind more steps. Have you ever made the sauce from scratch?

Nancy Welsh says
March 14, 2018 at 2:46 pm

Made this last night. It was delicious! Thank you!

Amy says
March 7, 2018 at 7:27 pm

just to clarify, does this recipe use red or green enchilada sauce? the recipe reads green, but the link attached to the green enchilada sauce is a recipe for the red kind.

- Heather Cheney says
  March 9, 2018 at 10:15 am
  
  Yes, I use green enchilada sauce. My recipe card sometimes pulls links incorrectly. Sorry. Thanks for checking!
  
  - Amy says
    March 9, 2018 at 7:14 pm
    
    thanks! im going to make this after my next shopping trip 🙂
techlazy.com says
April 1, 2017 at 6:13 am

Thanks for the tip on draining ground beef. That’s the part I hate about cooking bulk amounts of ground beef and I never thought of lining a bowl to catch the grease

Mexican Style Ground Beef