Slow Cooker Barbacoa Tacos
When you’re craving a rich, beefy taco, these slow cooker barbacoa tacos hit the spot.
A beef roast slowly cooks in a homemade guajillo chile sauce until it’s tender and fall-apart soft.
The meat is shredded and served simply in warm tortillas with red onion and fresh cilantro.
Barbacoa tacos are a traditional Mexican dish where the beef is prepared over a grill. Traditionally, it was an underground pit. But if like me you don’t have an underground pit available to you and since it is winter not much grilling is going on, a modern-day slow cooker works just as well.
Barbacoa tacos are a traditional Mexican meal. The meat is slow cooked in a dried guajillo pepper sauce. This is similar to the sauce in these slow cooker pineapple pepper carnitas tacos. Dried guajillo chile peppers are a mild to medium pepper, so they don’t bring too much heat to the sauce.
The peppers are toasted in a dry pan to bring out extra flavor and then added to boiling water along with all the aromatics for the sauce. Garlic, cilantro and fresh tomato and sweetened with agave. They are simmered for a little to soften and then blended to complete the braising sauce.
Since the beef is slow cooked for many hours a chuck roast works very well with this cut of meat. It needs a lot of cooking to help break it down and make it tender.
These slow cooker barbacoa tacos make a great weeknight dinner. You can make the sauce the night before then throw everything into the slow cooker before leaving for work the next day. These tacos also make great leftovers.
Slow Cooker Barbacoa Tacos
Video
Ingredients
- 6 dried Guajillo chiles, stemmed and seeded * see note
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled
- Small handful cilantro
- 1 tomato, chopped
- 2 teaspoons agave nectar
- 2 teaspoon salt
- 3 pounds (1.3 kg) boneless chuck roast, fat trimmed
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 ½ teaspoon Mexican oregano
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 12 corn tortillas
- ¼ of a red onion, chopped
- Fresh cilantro, chopped
Instructions
- Add 2 cups water to a saucepan and bring to a boil.
- While the water is heating, add the chiles to a non-stick pan over medium heat. Press the chiles into the pan so they toast, turning often, don’t burn.
- Transfer the peppers to the boiling water and add the garlic, cilantro, tomato, agave and salt. Turn down to a simmer for 1 minute. Turn off the heat and steep for 15 minutes to soften the peppers.
- When the peppers have softened, transfer to a food processor or blender and blend until smooth. Strain the sauce into the slow cooker. Discard the paste from the strainer.
- Turn the slow cooker on low.
- Season the beef with the salt, oregano and cumin, rub the seasoning all over the meat. Add the beef to the slow cooker and spoon a little of the sauce over the meat.
- Cover and cook for 8 hours on low or 4 hours on high.
- When the beef is done, remove some of the liquid until there is only enough left in the slow cooker to come half way up the meat. ** see note
- Use 2 forks to shred to the beef, mixing into the liquid to moisten and flavor the meat, add more liquid if required. Taste the meat and add more salt if needed, mix well.
- Serve in corn tortillas and top with chopped red onion, cilantro and any other toppings you like.
Love the photos! Great work.
I need this in my life!! These looks delicious!
Whenever my son asks for a snack, I serve Barbacoa Tacos. He also likes it so much. I prefer excess amount of tomato slices to make it further healthy.