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5 Quick & Easy Taco Recipes For Your Next Camping Trip

This post was updated on March 15th, 2024

Not every RV or travel trailer has access to a full kitchen complete with a microwave oven or even a 3-way fridge. While many types of meals can be made while on the road, the most perfect and easy-to-make dish might just be the humble taco.

taco recipes
Could the taco be the world’s most perfect camping food? Photo by dolvvita108

If you don’t already know, a taco is a traditional dish from Mexico. It consists of a corn or wheat flour tortilla folded or rolled around filling. The filling can include meat, seafood, vegetables, and various sauces such as tomato or corn salsa.

Tacos can be filled out with other nutritional items such as beans, grilled peppers, guacamole, lettuce, and spinach. In addition, the taco is a handheld food and there’s no need to break out the forks and knives. However, you might need some napkins since tacos tend to be messy.

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tacos
Tacos are easy to make while on the road and don’t require utensils. Photo by Jeremy Keith

The ingredients for tacos are easy to carry around while camping. Taco shells and wraps don’t need to be refrigerated and they last much longer than regular bread—sometimes up to a month.

Many tacos can be made with canned or boxed items or vegetables that also don’t need refrigeration. Ground beef, the staple of most tacos, can easily be picked up at grocery stores or even convenience stores.

These five taco recipes use minimal ingredients and each dish can be made in about 20 minutes. They are not only nutritious and filling, but they can be made quickly and each recipe can be expanded to feed two or 20 people. If you want warms tortillas, you can either heat or brown them in a cast iron pan or wrap them in aluminum foil and place them in a pot on the stove. Keep tortillas warm with an inexpensive tortilla warmer.

1. One Pot/One Pan Build-Your-Own Taco

This recipe is a quick, basic taco recipe and only requires one pan and one pot. This is helpful if you only have a two-burner camp stove. The pan is for cooking the ground beef or ground pork. The pot is to heat up a can of black or pinto beans.

tacos
Photo by JaBB

The ingredients are your choice and tacos can be topped with a mix of greens, onions, mushrooms, salsas, and sour cream. This recipe is also a great way to use up leftover items.

Ingredients & Directions:

  1. Open a can of black or pinto beans and drain out liquid. Heat beans in a covered pan over low to medium heat.
  2. Brown ground beef or ground pork in a cast iron. Add a package of taco seasoning and mix. When meat is done place in a covered dish and clean out pan with a paper towel. Use the same pan to heat or brown tortilla shells (if desired).
  3. Place all ingredients on the picnic table and build your own taco. Don’t forget the hot sauce!

Optional: Add a small can of salsa to the meat while cooking

2. Sweet Potato Vegetarian Taco

If you don’t eat meat or seafood, no problem. Tacos can be made from a variety of vegetables such as grilled peppers, grilled corn, cauliflower, tofu, and of course, beans. The key is to make your main ingredient flavorful but not overpowering to the other toppings. One of these ingredients is sweet potato or yam.

taco
Photo by Lauren Lonergan

These sweet tubers make a simple, yet flavorful, alternative to meat and go well with Mexican spices such as chili and lime. Sweet potatoes and yams are also one of those veggies that don’t need to be stored in the cooler.

Ingredients & Directions:

  1. Peel and cube two small sweet potatoes or yams.
  2. Pour olive oil in a cast iron pan and add in potatoes.
  3. Sprinkle potatoes with salt, pepper, smoked paprika, cumin, and chili powder.
  4. Cook potatoes until they are tender. Some pans may need to be covered to speed up cooking time.
  5. Remove potatoes from the pan and place flour tortilla shells in the pan to heat up or lightly brown.
  6. Place potatoes into tortilla shells and top with your choice of toppings such as coleslaw, spinach, avocado, or red onions. Cholula sauce also goes well with sweet potatoes and yams.
3. Egg & Zucchini Breakfast Taco

Is there anything that can’t go in a taco? Eggs are one of the best ingredients for tacos and when they are scrambled, they fit nicely into a flour tortilla pocket. Breakfast tacos are quick and require minimal cleanup, so you can move on with your daily adventures.

tacos
Photo by jimsideas

This recipe uses zucchini, but other vegetables such as tomatoes, mushrooms, or even potatoes can be used or added. If you are a meat-eater, take out the zucchini and add bacon or sausage instead.

Ingredients & Directions:

  1. Dice up two small green zucchini and add to a cast iron or non-stick pan with some olive or vegetable oil. Cook until nearly tender.
  2. Whip up 4 to 6 eggs and add to the same pan. Cook eggs until 3/4 way done and mix with the zucchini.
  3. Add salt, pepper, and a few tablespoons of salsa to the egg/zucchini and mix. Use the rest of the salsa as a topping.
  4. Place all ingredients into warmed or browned tortillas and enjoy.
4. Actually Tasty Shelf-Stable Food Taco

Shelf-stable food is food that does not need to be refrigerated. These types of foods also last for a long time and can be stored for emergency rations. Keeping a few shelf-stable foods in your RV or travel trailer can help if you are far from a grocery store.

recipes
Photo by Jo Zimny Photos

In addition, they can be used for emergency tacos. Some of the best ingredients for these tacos include dried rice, canned beans, canned corn, and canned salsa. Crunchy corn tortillas also work best for this recipe since they last longer than flour tortillas.

Ingredients & Directions:

  1. Open a can of Cuban Style Black Beans (Trader Joe’s has a nice one), drain the liquid, and heat in a pot on the stove.
  2. Open up a can of yellow corn and drain the liquid.
  3. Mix the drained corn with a few tablespoons of Herdez salsa casera or salsa verde. This will be the corn salsa topping for the beans.
  4. If you have any spices such as chili, dried chives, or dried onions, add these to the corn salsa.
  5. Place the beans into each tortilla shell and top with the corn salsa.

Optional: Heat up packaged chicken to add some additional protein.

5. Nutella & Marshmallow Dessert Taco

What are you usually doing after dinner? Sitting around the campfire is a popular part of an après-dinner evening, so what better way to celebrate than to make dessert over the fire?

recipes
Photo by John Sonderman

This dessert taco is very similar to a s’more and can quickly be made in a cast iron skillet over a low fire or coals. All you need is flour tortillas, a jar of Nutella, a bag of mini marshmallows, and a bag of crushed pecans or almonds.

Ingredients & Directions:

  1. Lay each flour tortilla on a plate and spread one side with a thin layer of Nutella. Sprinkle marshmallows and a few nuts on top and fold in half.
  2. Place folded tortilla onto a warm cast iron pan on the fire and flip it with a spatula or tongs until the tortilla is lightly browned and the marshmallows are melted.
  3. Place tortilla on a plate, let cool, and cut into wedges to eat.



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