taco night?

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alottamama
alottamama Posts: 46
in Recipes
My family and I enjoy taco night occasionally...any suggestions for continuing this in a healthy way?
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  • Hozman121
    Hozman121 Posts: 76 Member
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    We are having taco salad tonight. We do salad instead of just tacos because I don't want to eat the shells. We do turkey meat and I mix in a can of rotel for flavor and some moisture. Black beans, olives, onion, FF sour cream, avocado, and low fat cheese. Another thing we do a lot of is fajitas and I just eat the meat and veggies with no tortilla.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    Low fat beef or chicken with taco seasoning, low fat cheese, lots of salsa, low fat/nonfat sour cream, avocado (if I don't have many calories I skip the last two)... Get low calorie tortillas, or just taco shells (they're not that bad frankly, 60 calories per or something). Just have 2 or 3 instead of 4 or 5. Or just with lettuce if you're low on calories.
  • knra_grl
    knra_grl Posts: 1,568 Member
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    Tacos aren't that bad - I usually make a base salad and add the taco meat and crush up one of the shells for the crunch - I just find it easier to eat as a salad

    You could substitute ground turkey or chicken and low fat cheese as others have pointed out but once cheese is shredded it seems like there is more than you think and you won't actually use that much - just make sure you measure and weigh what you put on your plate - I replace the sour cream with 0% greek yogurt and can't tell the difference.
  • Flab2Fab27
    Flab2Fab27 Posts: 461 Member
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    Tacos... The food of the gods.
  • Ke11er
    Ke11er Posts: 147 Member
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    Lots of great ideas already to make taco night even easier to manage. I also like fajitas with all the veggies and to substitute plain Greek yogurt instead of sour cream. Do you like taco salad and lettuce wraps at Chinese restaurants? If so then you also might enjoy a fusion idea where you use a large, sturdy lettuce leaf instead of a taco shell (but if not, they're not to hard to fit in either!)
  • ReinasWrath
    ReinasWrath Posts: 1,173 Member
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    lean ground beef or chicken for the meat and try plain non fat greek yogurt instead of sour cream, low fat cheese and bam =)
  • KeepCalmNGetyaSweatOn
    KeepCalmNGetyaSweatOn Posts: 361 Member
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    Taco night is easy to be healthy and low calorie. Taco shells (the crunchy kind) aren't really that bad nutrition wise. Use half lean beef half turkey for the meat. Low fat cheese, plain greek yogurt as a replacement for sour cream. Low sodium taco seasoning, salsa lettuce and BOOM :tongue: Thanks for the idea I am having tacos tomorrow for dinner.
  • mustgetmuscles1
    mustgetmuscles1 Posts: 3,346 Member
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    Nothing unhealthy about taco. Unless you try to take mine or substitute one of the ingredients.
  • dawlschic007
    dawlschic007 Posts: 636 Member
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    I have taco night a lot. I use La Fe tortillas (90 calories per tortilla) and use lean ground turkey for the meat with bell peppers and red onions. Light sour cream, lettuce, tomato, and make up some guacamole. It's not all that bad calorie wise. I think two comes out to about 500 calories, if that. You can also do street tacos and use corn tortillas and lean sirloin steak.
  • christa279
    christa279 Posts: 222 Member
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    I make mine with ground chicken or turkey. I don't think the hard shells or the soft tacos are horribly bad (just watch the size of the soft/tortillas). If I want to cut the carbs/calories, I will sometimes use a leaf of lettuce as the shell. I don't do sour cream, so usually just salsa or tomatoes, cheese, onions, and I make my own taco seasoning (so I can control the sodium and whatnot).
  • marcellomoo
    marcellomoo Posts: 107 Member
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    Lean meat, lettuce wraps and dice some mushrooms/ onions/ tomatoes/ kidney beans in with the meat to fill it out.
  • aprilflower18232
    aprilflower18232 Posts: 205 Member
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    My family and I enjoy taco night occasionally...any suggestions for continuing this in a healthy way?

    Ground turkey instead of beef...either whole wheat tortillas or just make a salad out of it....and if you like sour cream use plain Greek yogurt instead...
  • lyricsmamma6469
    lyricsmamma6469 Posts: 37 Member
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    I use ground turkey or chicken and usually turn mine into salads using flavored tortilla chips (chile lime is good). I crunch the chips up to add a nice crunchy texture. I also found flat bread wraps that make a large burrito and they're only 90 calories for the whole wrap. They make great flat bread pizzas too!
  • leaner426
    leaner426 Posts: 90
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    My favorite tacos are chicken breast meat cooked in a little lime juice with some cilantro. Put it in a stand and stuff shell with a little shreaded sharp cheddar cheese, salsa and if you want a little sour cream. Add a side salad and you're good. Or you can just use the meat to make a salad, crumble part of a taco shell on top for crunchiness. Or you can use lettuce in place of the shell.

    If you really like chips/salsa, and substituting celery for the chips does not work for you then I take a single taco shell and use it instead. Break it up and use as chips. It keeps me from having a bag of chips around that I would keep eating.
  • Acg67
    Acg67 Posts: 12,142 Member
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    For everyone saying lean beef and low fat cheese, sour cream etc, what makes that any healthier?
  • SGM_Adonis
    SGM_Adonis Posts: 1,565 Member
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    Fish tacos...cabbage, lime, salsa, a little guacamole, grilled fish...a corn tortilla. Mmmm mmm mmm.
  • cathipa
    cathipa Posts: 2,991 Member
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    Sub lentils for ground beef. Cook 1 cup lentils & 1 package of taco seasoning in 2.5 cups vegetable/chicken broth for 30 minutes. Skip the taco shells for taco salad. Use greek yogurt in place of sour cream. Guacamole is also very good and healthy. Salsa is low in calories, but high in flavor. This is making me hungry....I might have to make this for tonight!
  • sherisse69
    sherisse69 Posts: 795 Member
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    I LOVE tacos so I could never give them up. Somethings I do to make it fit a little easier:
    Use a low fat cheddar
    Extra lean beef, drained after cooking
    Greek yogurt instead of sour cream
    And Lettuce wraps! This was the biggest thing for me - I love my crunchy shells - but it turns out wrapping all the goodness in an iceberg lettuce cup is quite fantastic as well.
    Don't get me wrong - I generally have 1 hard shell, and the rest in lettuce.

    Enjoy! :) .....now I may need to make tacos tonight...... ;)
  • tedrickp
    tedrickp Posts: 1,229 Member
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    For everyone saying lean beef and low fat cheese, sour cream etc, what makes that any healthier?

    I agree they aren't "healthier" by their nature, but they can definitely be handy when you need to hit certain macros, or stay under calorie goals.

    Now if you have an issue with people subbing lettuce for taco shells - we can form like Voltron and agree on that. I used to do that too, until I realized taco shells are' like 50 cals (regular old el paso crunchy, 65cals in stand and stuff).
  • shazbox1
    shazbox1 Posts: 175 Member
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    To get some more nutritional variety I sautee mushrooms, onions, peppers with the beef, add some corn and beans.

    To make lower the calorie count, I substitute the shells for a taco salad, use less cheese/sour cream.

    You could go with lower fat substitutes, but I like my cheese cheesey and my sour cream creamy.

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