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Prep time
30 minutes
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Cook time
20 minutes
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Makes
8 tacos
Author Notes
Inspired by old-school, ground-beef tacos, these are a best friend to hurried weeknights. Hopefully a cold beer is somewhere close by. Want to make your ingredient list a bit bigger? You could add: hot sauce, sliced or smashed avocado; sour cream or Greek yogurt; black or pinto beans; shaved or pickled jalapeños; or finely diced raw onion. —Emma Laperruque
Test Kitchen Notes
Featured in: 5-Ingredient Cauliflower Tacos For Tuesdays—and Every Day —The Editors
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Crunchy-Shell Cauliflower Tacos
Ingredients
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1
head cauliflower
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3 tablespoons
extra-virgin olive oil
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3 1/2 teaspoons
chili powder
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3/4 teaspoon
kosher salt, plus more to taste
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8
hard-shell tacos
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1 cup
shredded iceberg lettuce
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1 cup
grated pepper jack cheese
Directions
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Preheat the oven to 450° F. Line two rimmed sheet pans with silicone mats or parchment.
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Remove the very bottom of the cauliflower stem, as well as the green leaves. Roughly chop. Add about half to a food processor and pulse until it’s almost riced. Some chunks here and there are good—this is supposed to look like ground beef. Dump onto one lined sheet pan. Process the remaining cauliflower florets and add to the sheet pan. (Psst: Don’t try to process in one batch! It’s too much volume and will chop unevenly.) Add the olive oil, chili powder, and salt to the cauliflower. Toss. Divide this mixture between the two sheet trays. (Spreading the cauliflower out this much helps it brown, not steam.) Roast for about 20 minutes—rotating the pans top to bottom and front to back halfway through.
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When the cauliflower is done, remove from the oven and add the hard-shell tacos—either directly on the oven rack or onto another sheet pan—to toast for a couple minutes, until warm.
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Assemble the tacos in the following order: shell, cauliflower, lettuce, cheese.
Emma was the food editor at Food52. She created the award-winning column, Big Little Recipes, and turned it into a cookbook in 2021. These days, she's a senior editor at Bon Appétit, leading digital cooking coverage. Say hello on Instagram at @emmalaperruque.
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