Tacos are a delicious and exciting meal. They’re also incredibly versatile, as you can make them using ground beef, shredded pork, shredded chicken, or even vegetarian ingredients. Of course, the quality strongly depends on the taco mix you use. That’s why authentic taco seasoning mixes are so important.
True, you can find some pretty good mixes in the store, but they’re always packed with fillers, additives, and often far too much sodium (plus sugar, for some reason). Why not make your own instead? This way you can make a healthy and even tastier version.
In this list, we’ve sourced seasoning recipes from a selection of different food bloggers. Most are simply seasoning mixes that you can use in countless recipes. There are also a couple of recipes for tacos instead, as you can easily take the seasonings and use them for a completely different meal.
For more ideas, check out our list of spices for pulled pork and for Mexican food. Those lists have some themes in common, along with plenty of new ideas for your meals.
Finally, be sure to use fresh spices when preparing these seasoning mixes. Herbs and spices lose their potency over time, so the spice mix won’t taste like much at all if you make it using old ingredients.
Authentic Taco Seasoning Recipes (With Pictures!)
Easy Chicken Tacos
Let’s begin with something simple. This recipe comes from damndelicious.net – a site that always has amazing meals.
It’s a straightforward dish, relying on a five-ingredient spice rub that is used to flavor the chicken. Five ingredients are enough to make the chicken taste amazing, without requiring a stupid number of different spices.
While the recipe is designed for chicken, you could easily swap this out for another source of protein. If you do want to tweak it, the comments section is a great place for extra information. Some people even use canned chicken rather than chicken breast for the recipe.
Ground Beef Taco Seasoning
This recipe, from homecookingmemories.com, takes a different approach. This time you’re just making taco seasoning mix, which can then be used any time you make tacos.
The most exciting thing here is the small ingredients selection. Seriously, aside from salt and pepper, there are only four spices. It’s hard to get any simpler than that.
There is chili powder and cayenne pepper in the mix, making this a relatively spicy seasoning mix. Still, you could always decrease the amount of these if you want a milder option.
DIY Taco Seasoning
Here’s another spice mix. This one comes from Ali at gimmesomeoven.com and can be used for any protein source. It’s not limited to tacos either. You could even use this to add extra flavor to soups or stews.
It’s a more complex seasoning this time, with more than half a dozen spices. The extra spices mean the mix takes extra work, but also has much more flavor nuance.
You can also prep a large batch of this mix, store it, and then use it as you wish.
Keto Taco Seasoning
Taco seasoning sometimes includes sugar, particularly the store-bought varieties. Those versions aren’t great for keto, so Arman from thebigmansworld.com has created a keto friendly version.
The seasoning is designed to be versatile. So, you can use it on vegetables, fish, or meat. It’s not even limited to tacos. You might include this in other Mexican dishes or perhaps some completely different meal.
Chicken Taco Seasoning
Here’s another mix to try. This one comes from Carine at sweetashoney.co and is designed for chicken tacos. The recipe is a little different, as it’s designed to be less spicy than traditional taco seasoning and more like fajita seasoning.
There’s a decent number of spices this time, but the selection isn’t too overwhelming. Carine also mentions that you can halve the amount of chili powder if you’re worried about the mix being too spicy.
Smoky Taco Seasoning
This recipe comes from mindfulmomma.com and offers a wonderful smoky flavor. Micaela’s post also highlights why it’s so important to make your own taco seasoning. As she points out, the ingredient lists for commercial products are insane, often containing much more sugar and fillers than actual spices.
Large Batch Homemade Taco Seasoning
This recipe from iowagirleats.com is designed to give you a large jar of seasoning mix that you can use repeatedly. Like most of the recipes on this list, the mix is free from artificial ingredients, gluten, and fillers.
In fact, the only ingredients are six different spices, plus salt and pepper. These are all familiar spices too, ones that you probably already have in your cupboard.
Tacos Al Pastor (Three Methods)
Let’s step away from pure spice mixes for a minute. This recipe from keviniscooking.com focuses on tacos al pastor, so it gives you all of the ingredients and steps you need, rather than just the seasoning mix.
Another big difference is that this recipe (like many other tacos al pastor recipes) relies on a wet marinade rather than a dry spice rub. The marinade helps to keep your meat moist and is particularly helpful for cheaper cuts of meat.
Homemade Taco Seasoning
This recipe from slenderkitchen.com doesn’t just tell you which spices to include. Kristen also explains what each of the spices adds to the flavor profile. This information makes it easy to tweak the recipe if you want.
For example, you might use more smoked paprika to increase the smokiness of the seasoning. Or, if you don’t want smokiness, you could easily use sweet paprika instead.
Kristen also provides examples of different ways to use the taco seasoning. This includes the amount of seasoning you need to make homemade tacos, along with some other ideas.
Chicken Taco Seasoning
Despite the name, this recipe from feastingnotfasting.com isn’t just suitable for chicken tacos. It works just as well for any type of taco you can imagine.
What I love the most is how much extra information Christy provides. Her post is packed full of details, including different ways to use the seasoning, what the different ingredient ratios look like all measured out, the amount of seasoning you use per recipe, and how you store it. That information is powerful if you plan to make a big batch of the spice mix.
Taco Seasoning
This recipe from downshiftology.com follows a familiar style. It relies on some of the spices that we’ve seen before too, including paprika and chili powder.
The listed version isn’t too spicy, but you could easily add an extra kick to it if you wanted to. Lisa also has a short list of tips to help you tweak the recipe to your needs.
Homemade Tacos Al Pastor
Here’s another tacos al pastor recipe. This one comes from seriouseats.com and uses a combination of bacon and thin pork sirloin.
The recipe provides plenty of details about how to prepare the meat and get your tacos perfect every time. There’s a decent selection of spices in the mix as well, which will give the tacos plenty of nuance.
Spicy Taco Seasoning
Do you want your tacos to have a kick? If so, this recipe from goodlifeeats.com provides all the heat you need. Like most recipes on this list, you can easily make the seasoning in bulk, so there’s always some on hand when you need it.
In her discussion, Katie mentions that it’s best to start with just a small amount of the seasoning on your meat. This is particularly true if you are sensitive to spice. After all, you can always add more taco seasoning later, but you’ve wrecked the whole meal if you add too much at the beginning.
Easy Homemade Taco Seasoning
Then there’s this recipe. It comes from Holly at spendwithpennies.com and works well with most Mexican-inspired recipes. She also gives a list of other ways that you can use the seasoning.
It’s also worth noting that you’d use different amounts of this taco seasoning than a seasoning from the packet. This is the same for most recipes on this list, so it’s important to check the instructions for each of the seasoning mixes.
Mild Taco Seasoning
This mild taco seasoning recipe comes from Samantha at everydayfamilycooking.com. It’s a fairly simple recipe, with just six ingredients (and one of those is optional). Samantha also provides details about the best time to season your taco meat and what to do if your cooked meat ends up too spicy.
Chicken Taco Seasoning
Not surprisingly, this recipe from savorthebest.com is a fantastic choice for chicken tacos. It’s rich in flavor, but isn’t too spicy or intense. This means that even those sensitive to heat should be able to enjoy it without problem.
Interestingly, the recipe includes a little brown sugar. While sugar is commonly used in commercial taco mixes, you don’t often see it in homemade versions. Still, sugar is a good way to decrease the intensity of a taco mix.
Rachel’s Taco Seasoning
Here’s another version to try. This one comes from rachelcooks.com and features many of the same spices as other entries. I love how Rachel provides plenty of adaptations for the recipe, like how you can increase or decrease the spiciness or lower the sodium level.
She also mentions that you leave the cumin out. Still, she cautions against doing so, as cumin is a key flavor in traditional taco seasoning. You’ll still get a delicious seasoning mix without the cumin, but your meal won’t taste quite like traditional tacos.
Secret Ingredient Homemade Taco Seasoning
Finally, we have this recipe from inspiredtaste.net. The title Secret Ingredient Homemade Taco Seasoning is apt too, as the recipe uses two ingredients that aren’t seen in most of the other recipes on this list. One of those two ingredients is very unexpected indeed.
I won’t give away the secret ingredient though. That would be rude. You’ll need to check out the recipe for yourself.
Common Taco Seasoning Spices
If you’ve looked through some of these seasoning recipes, you’ve probably noticed that they rely on many of the same spices. The biggest difference is often just the ratios of the spices.
This isn’t surprising. If you used a different collection of spices, then you wouldn’t have taco seasoning. So, what are the common spices and what do they add?
Chili Powder
Chili powder features in most taco seasoning mixes. It’s actually a spice blend of its own, which relies on ingredients like garlic, oregano, cumin, and dried chili peppers.
If you’re in the United States, chili powder tends to be mild and smoky. This is why it’s even included in mild and kid-friendly taco seasoning recipes. However, the flavor profile isn’t the same everywhere. In some other places, chili powder is much spicier and you’ll want much less of it in your seasoning mix.
Be sure to choose high quality chili powder here, preferably a brand that doesn’t rely on fillers or additives. Keep an eye on the salt content too. If the powder uses a decent amount of salt, you might need to add less salt into the seasoning mix.
Cayenne Or Red Pepper Flakes
Cayenne powder or red pepper flakes are used to add heat to your taco seasoning. The ingredients have roughly the same effect, so you can use whichever one you prefer.
Remember that it’s easy to add extra spice to your tacos or seasoning mix later, while decreasing the spiciness is much more difficult. Because of this, it’s often best to start with small amounts of heat and try the seasoning mix out before you add more.
Oregano
Oregano offers an important contrast to the other ingredients, providing some fresh herbal tones. Without it, your tacos risk being too smoky and rich.
Paprika (Sweet Or Smoked)
Paprika lends depth of flavor and a touch of smokiness to the seasoning mix, making it tasty and more complex without adding heat. Paprika is particularly important if you’re focusing on mild tacos.
Not surprisingly, using smoked paprika gives you a smokier seasoning than regular sweet paprika. You can even use a combination of both types. Doing so is perfect if you just want a touch of smokiness.
Cumin
Cumin is the most controversial inclusion in taco seasoning, as some people can’t stand the flavor. However, it’s an important ingredient too and your tacos won’t really taste like tacos without it.
Onion Powder And Garlic Powder
These two powders add important aromatics to the blend, helping to round it out. They’re not as essential as other spices though, as you can easily simply use fresh onions and garlic when you’re preparing your tacos.
Some recipes also leave out one or both of these ingredients. For example, the one from downshiftology.com features garlic powder, but not onion powder.
Salt And Pepper
Most recipes also add a little salt and pepper for extra flavor, where you can tweak the amount based on your own preferences. You can use regular table salt here or go for a different type, like Himalayan salt.
While the salt plays an important role, you can leave it out if you’re following a low sodium diet. The other spices add plenty of flavor, so you will still end up with delicious tacos.
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