Birria Taco Slow Cooker Hack
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If you follow me on Instagram you know that I am a proponent of the old school slow cooker. I know that kids are all about the Instant Pot these days, but I also know that an Instant Pot is just a smartly-branded pressure cooker, and those things are still terrifying to me. I, however, am perfectly willing to trust that I can turn on my slow cooker and go out and leave it unsupervised in my house all day, and I’ll come home to delicious, tender stew and a house that smells amazing but hasn’t been blown up.
When I make any sort of meat in my slow cooker, I always make enough for at least two meals, and one of those meals is always tacos. But I recently realized that said slow cooker meat could not be more perfect for birria tacos. “Birria” refers to a type of meat stew in Mexican cuisine, but apparently the hot new thing for the taco scene here in California is birria tacos, in which the corn tortillas are dunked in the glorious meat liquid of the stew before being stuffed with the tender meat and lightly crisped on the griddle/comal. There’s a taqueria near my house that takes it ones step further into the realm of awesome and melts a layer of cheese onto the tortilla before stuffing it. That’s the version that I recreated here.
In this episode of awkwardly vague recipes, I’ll attempt to explain how it did it. Also, please excuse the sub-par photos, which were only meant to be used for my Insta Stories before I started to get questions about how to make them.
How to Make Easy Birria Tacos from Leftover Stew
Simmer your leftover stewed meat and braising liquid/broth from your earlier slow cooker or Instant Pot adventure. I made this with brisket that had been stewed in a homemade BBQ sauce that had some notes of Mexican seasonings (mainly, canned chipotles in adobo sauce) but I honestly think it will work with most stews, and you can always add some taco-appropriate hot sauce at this step.
Heat up a non-stick flat griddle, which will stand in for a comal. Take a corn tortilla, fully coat it in the broth, and place it on the griddle. Top it with shredded cheese—I recommend mozzarella, jack, quesillo, or queso chihuahua.
Once the cheese just starts to melt, flip the tortilla and cook the cheese to your desired level of golden brown.
Flip the tortilla back over, top with stewed meat. Fold in half to form the taco and continue to cook until the tortilla shell reaches the desired level of crisp.
Serve with chopped cilantro and onion.