Learn how to make ground chicken tacos with your own homemade taco seasoning blend! This ground chicken taco recipe comes together quickly and is made with pantry staples that you probably already have on hand. The meat is cooked with onions, garlic and red pepper and seasoned with pantry-staple spices (just like my ground beef quesadillas). It’s fresh and tasty, and you control how spicy you want it to be. Then it’s the fun part…the taco meat can obviously be used in tacos, but there are SO many other ways to use it. I’m sharing a whole list of ideas below. You might just want to double – or even triple – the batch, it’s perfect for freezing.
And if you love tacos as much as we do, be sure to try my easy fish tacos, fish tacos with mango salsa, turkey taco skillet, slow cooker salsa chicken tacos, and breakfast tacos next time.
I personally love these tacos with cool guacamole and freshly grated sharp cheddar cheese served up in crispy corn tortillas, but the best part of taco night (or enchilada casserole night) is that everyone makes their own, so I always serve with a variety of toppings and refrain from sharing my own opinion too much. 😉
Estimated reading time: 8 minutes
Table of Contents
- What You’ll Love About Ground Chicken Tacos
- Ingredients
- How to Make Ground Chicken Tacos
- How to Serve Ground Chicken Taco Meat
- Storage Instructions
- How to Serve Ground Chicken Taco Recipe to the Whole Family
- What to Serve with Ground Chicken Tacos
- More Easy Taco Recipes
- It’s 5pm. Are you still wondering what’s for dinner?
- Helpful Tools to Making Tacos with Ground Chicken
What You’ll Love About Ground Chicken Tacos
- Complex flavors without a lot of work
- Made with pantry staples
- Quick and easy meal
- Just 20 minutes cook time
- So many ways to serve it
Ingredients
The ingredients to make this taco meat are pretty basic and the spices are probably items you already have in your pantry:
- Olive oil – Use a high quality olive oil for best flavor, or any vegetable oil.
- Onion – I’ve used white onion, but you could also use yellow or even red onion.
- Bell pepper – I’ve used red for a pop of color, but yellow or orange would also work.
- Garlic – Use fresh garlic for best flavor or frozen garlic for a convenient shortcut.
- Ground chicken – You want to look for ground chicken that is about 93% lean and NOT 99% lean unless you like dry chicken. You can also use ground turkey, ground beef, or even ground pork.
- Spices – Garlic powder, ground cumin, smoked paprika (or regular), dried oregano, chili powder, sea salt
- Corn starch – This is used to help thicken the homemade taco seasoning and sauce. You can omit it, but you’ll need to simmer the mixture a bit longer.
- Chicken broth – This is used to give the taco meat a saucy flavor and keep it nice and juicy. You can use water, or grab some bouillon cubes so you can easily mix up small amounts of broth.
- Tortillas – Use crunchy or soft corn tortillas or flour tortillas.
- Taco toppings – Items like guacamole or avocado, copycat Chipotle corn salsa, shredded sharp cheddar, sour cream, salsa or pico de gallo, lettuce, fresh cilantro, diced onions, sliced jalapeno, and diced tomatoes.
How to Make Ground Chicken Tacos
Let’s get to this ground chicken taco recipe! Here’s how we make it:
- Saute aromatics. Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and red pepper and cook until soft. Add garlic and cook until fragrant.
- Cook ground chicken. Add ground chicken to onion mixture, breaking up meat with a wooden spoon, and cook until almost cooked through.
- Prep slurry. In a small bowl, whisk together chicken broth and corn starch until smooth (or mostly smooth).
- Season taco meat. Sprinkle spices over chicken meat and mix well into meat, letting spices toast for a minute.
- Thicken taco meat. Add chicken broth slurry to meat and bring to a boil. Cook, until thick.
- Serve tacos. Serve tacos with a variety of toppings and tortillas or use meat in one of the other ways.
How to Serve Ground Chicken Taco Meat
Tacos with ground chicken are an obvious choice, but there is also so many other ways you can use this taco meat:
- Tacos – Serve with crunchy taco shells or flour tortillas, along with your favorite taco toppings. I like to put out a traditional taco spread of guacamole or avocado, copycat Chipotle corn salsa, shredded sharp cheddar, sour cream, salsa or pico de gallo, lettuce, fresh cilantro, and diced tomatoes.
- Tostada – Layer refried beans, chicken, and fresh toppings over a crispy tostada shell. (Swap out chicken for beef in this ground beef tostada recipe.)
- Ground chicken taco bowl – Serve over rice or black bean quinoa salad and traditional taco fixings and let everyone make their own bowl.
- Ground chicken taco salad – Serve over chopped romaine lettuce, along with black beans, taco meat, sour cream, salsa, and crushed tortilla chips. (Swap out the ground chicken for ground beef in this taco salad recipe.)
- Stuffed into quesadillas – Try the air fryer quesadilla or swapped for the steak in these steak quesadillas.
Storage Instructions
Store leftover ground chicken taco meat in the refrigerator for 3-4 days.
How to reheat
Reheat taco meat in a hot skillet or in the microwave until heated through.
Can you freeze chicken taco meat?
Yes, you can store the chicken in an airtight container (stasher bags work well!) in the freezer for 2-3 months.
How to Serve Ground Chicken Taco Recipe to the Whole Family
I get it, feeding kids can be tough! But following the Division of Responsibility and knowing your job and your child’s job makes it SO much more enjoyable. You’ll be able to feed your kids any meal, which will help ensure that they are eating a variety of nutritious foods – with plenty of play food sprinkled in. 😉
Tacos are one of the ultimate DIY meals, so put out a spread and let everyone build their own tacos. This is a time when my kids often make creations that don’t appeal to me – but it’s a great way to let them experiment and make their own creation – and I just keep my mouth shut and my opinions to myself!
All of my articles on feeding kids can be found here and if you want a FULL list of all of the videos I have with hacks, tips, scripts, and ideas for feeding kids, check out my instagram or tiktok page.
What to Serve with Ground Chicken Tacos
There are a number of great Mexican-ish sides that pair perfectly with tacos:
- Chipotle copycat fajita veggies
- Mexican-style cauliflower rice
- Tex-Mex side salad
- Grilled Mexican street corn
- Black bean cowboy caviar
- 49 sides for Tex Mex meals
More Easy Taco Recipes
If you like this ground chicken taco recipe, you might also like some of these other easy taco recipes:
- Slow Cooker Salsa Chicken Tacos
- Slow Cooker Shredded Beef Tacos
- Easy Fish Tacos (with fish sticks)
- Breakfast Tacos
It’s 5pm. Are you still wondering what’s for dinner?
Menu Plans by My Everyday Table can help you out.
The plan addresses three major issues when it comes to weeknight dinners: having a plan, time, and one family meal.
You’ll save time, save money, waste less food, and feel calm when 5pm hits because your dinner is already planned.
Helpful Tools to Making Tacos with Ground Chicken
- 12″ Skillet – Use a large skillet with more surface area and the meat for these healthy ground chicken tacos will cook up incredibly fast. I’ve had this one for more than 10+ years and it’s still in great shape.
- Citrus Juicer – You’ll want to keep one of these on-hand for whenever you’re working with fresh lemons or limes.
Ground Chicken Tacos Recipe
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 4 servings 1x
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Skillet
- Cuisine: Tex Mex
Description
Learn how to make ground chicken tacos with homemade taco seasoning that’s made with pantry staples. You can use this meat in so many ways.
Ingredients
- 1 Tbsp. olive oil
- 1/2 white onion, finely chopped
- 1 red bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped
- 1/2 tsp. sea salt
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 lb. ground chicken (don’t use 99% fat free)
- 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp. smoked paprika
- 1/4 tsp. dried oregano
- 1/8 tsp. chili powder
- 1 Tbsp. corn starch
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 12 taco shells
- toppings: guacamole, shredded sharp cheddar cheese, sour cream, salsa, pico de gallo, hot sauce, shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, cilantro, diced onion, lime wedges
Instructions
- Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.
- Add onion and red pepper to skillet and cook for 4-5 minutes until just soft. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds, or until fragrant.
- Add ground chicken and cook 3-4 minutes.
- While chicken is cooking, in a small bowl, whisk together corn starch and chicken broth until smooth.
- Add dry spices to skillet and mix everything well, then add the chicken broth mixture and bring to a boil.
- Turn the heat down to low, cover and simmer for 3-4 minutes, stirring frequently, until the liquid has evaporated and mixture has thickened.
- While the chicken is cooking, prep toppings.
- Serve tacos with a variety toppings.
Notes
- Nutrition facts are for ground chicken taco meat only.
- I’ve used hard crunchy corn shells, but you can use any type of shells.
Keywords: ground chicken tacos, ground chicken taco recipe, ground chicken tacos recipe, how to make ground chicken tacos
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Photo Credit: All photos in this post were take by Loren at Sweet Rustic Bakes
Allie @ Sweet Potato Bites
I need to have more taco tuesdays in my life…this looks like a solid recipe too!
Emily
Me too! I might make that a 2015 goal. 😉
sarah k @ the pajama chef
i love how fresh & flavorful these tacos look! mmm!
Anna Johnson
yum, these look amazing.