Taco Tater Tot Casserole Recipe
This scrumptious taco tater tot casserole recipe includes a layer of tater tots loaded with your favorite taco flavors, like taco seasoning, melted cheese, beef, and the toppings of your choice.
I love tacos in any form but have always had a fondness for taco casserole ever since I first remember Mama making it as a child (see her taco casserole recipe here). This taco tater tot casserole recipe is a more convenient (and a little simpler) spin on Mama’s, involving tater tots as the foundation layer. My husband, Ricky, who used to swear he didn’t like casseroles, can’t get enough of this one. I bet you’ll have plenty of takers in your house, too!
The recipe is below, but let me tell you, it’s quick and easy. You just add a layer of tater tots to the bottom of your casserole and cook your flavored ground beef before adding it on top. Then add a layer of cheese, bake it in the oven, and serve it alongside your favorite taco toppings. It’s filled with the taco flavors we know and love, but with the addition of tater tots (and who doesn’t love them?). It’s hearty, filling, and delicious.
If you want to streamline it even more, make double the taco meat (through step 2) and freeze half of it for a quick to throw together casserole next time.
Recipe Ingredients
- Frozen tater tots
- Ground beef
- Taco seasoning
- Barbecue sauce
- Shredded cheddar cheese
- Taco toppings of your choice
How to Make Taco Tater Tot Casserole Recipe
Place a layer of frozen tater tots in the bottom of an 8×8 casserole dish. Set aside.
In a large skillet, brown the ground beef until it’s no longer pink. Then add the water, taco seasoning mix, and barbecue sauce. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until thickened. It will be very saucy and that is fine.
Spoon the taco beef mixture over the tater tots. Sprinkle with shredded cheddar cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Top with your favorite taco toppings and enjoy!
Storage
- Store leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days.
- You can freeze the casserole for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight before reheating briefly in the oven.
Recipe Notes
- Here are some taco toppings you might want to add on top of your taco tater tot casserole: green onions, shredded lettuce, Pico de Gallo, salsa, hot sauce, crushed tortilla chips or tortilla chips, sour cream, olives, cilantro, and guacamole.
- You can use whatever shredded cheese you prefer or have on hand. Mexican blend, Monterey Jack, and Pepper Jack cheese would all work well.
- Think it can’t be tacos without corn and beans? Feel free to add a can of black beans or pinto beans, and either a can of corn or a cup of frozen corn kernels to your meat mixture.
- Add some spice with a can of diced green chiles.
- Want to add more flavor? Feel free to add 2 cloves of minced garlic, 1 chopped onion, and some bell pepper.
- Substitute the ground beef for ground pork or ground turkey.
Here are more terrific taco-flavored recipes:
Taco Soup (The World’s Easiest Supper)
Taco Pizza – Fast, Fresh, Delicious!
Sweet Potato and Black Bean Tacos
Ingredients
- 1 bag frozen tater tots small bag, you won't need them all
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 2 packets taco seasoning mix
- 1.5 cups water
- 1/2 cup barbecue sauce
- 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese I use sharp
- Taco toppings of your choice
Instructions
- Place a layer of frozen tater tots in the bottom of an 8x8 casserole dish. Set aside.1 bag frozen tater tots
- In a large skillet, brown the ground beef until it's no longer pink. Then add the water, taco seasoning mix, and barbecue sauce. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until thickened. It will be very saucy and that is fine.2 pounds ground beef, 2 packets taco seasoning mix, 1.5 cups water, 1/2 cup barbecue sauce
- Spoon the ground beef mixture over the tater tots. Sprinkle with shredded cheddar cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Top with your favorite taco toppings and enjoy!1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, Taco toppings of your choice
Nutrition
If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.
~Maya Angelou
Well this isn`t something Just my grandparents did, because there are a lot of people that do this….I could never kill something to eat! I`d starve or eat dirt. I thought of this because i remember my grandmothers, as well as my mother, killing and dressing chickens, My mom stood on their neck and pulled their feet, grandmas both , wrung their necks by grabbing their necks and twirling over their heads. I could never do that! Then they caught the headless flapping chickens and dunked them in boiling water and plucked & picked their feathers off, and etc etc.. Lots of nasty work even after killing them. Bless those women, best cooks and mothers ever…. I miss all three of them. ( Theyall 3 made the absolute best noodles and dumplings!)
I have enjoyed reading all of these comments. My answer would be mainly the same as a lot of others. My moms family were raised on a farm with 10 children. Both of my grandmothers were quilters and also made most of the clothes for their families. My mom also made most of our clothes. I have done a little sewing but that was with a modern sewing machine. Both sets of my grandparents were born in the 1800’s or very early 1900’s. My dad was born in 1924 and my mom in 1927.
My grandmother Avent could make lace, crochet, tat, do cutwork, and do them all beautifully. I have one of her corset covers she made and the stitches are almost microscopic! She was a woman of faith as was my grandmother Mitchell. My Avent kin are from western TN and my Mitchells are from Plano TX. They had to go through some heartbreaking times with sick children, one of my aunts had severe epilepsy and my momma developed terrible rheumatoid arthritis at a young age. She never talked about her life before she got sick, except for one time. She was a very private person, but I was playing my guitar when I was about 13 and she got a real funny look on her face. She just said, “I used to play guitar too, before I got sick.” Then she opened up a little about it. I was diagnosed at 30, after she had already gone home. I was thinking this morning, now I know why momma always said, “oh, lordy” every time she tried to get out of a chair! I miss her every day.
When my grandmother married a sharecropper he moved her to he Duke home place in Durham NC. They had seven children all born at home and dudnt make enough money to survive so when her father died and left her a farm, she took all they owned on a wagon pulling a cow behind and some chicken in crates sitting on top of everything packed in the wagon and walked and rode the wagon to Franklin County NC. There they bartered with a store to get enough seeds to grow a corn field with their old mule. The next year the corn profits paid the store back and they had to buy a new mule as the old one died. Her husband died when her last child was a baby and she raised her children by herself living off the land and the hard work she and the children were able to do. Her children and their spouses, plus the grandchildren adored her. She had everyone call her “Mammy”. When the neighbors children got sick they would bring them to her and she would keep the child until they recovered. I remember two little children bringing a sick baby to her when I was staying with her one summer. They didn’t bring anything to feed or dress the baby with but she tore up old sheets for diapers and made do. When the baby was well enough to go back home we put the baby in a little red wagon and pulled the wagon with baby all the way back home. What a wonderful woman. I am her only name sake and am looking forward to being with her again in Heaven.
My grandmother grew up on a farm and picked cotton (which I could probably do if I had to). My mom has told me the story of the time she got an Easter chick and when it grew up, her mom killed it and they ate it for dinner. She was devastated, but to her mom, it wasn’t a pet. That’s the whole reason I wasn’t allowed to get a chick in the 4th grade. I don’t think I could kill a chicken, much less one that was considered a pet to some extent!
My grandparents lived in a dugout in OKLAHOMA during the land rush. They also had 12 of their 16 kids there.
I suspect that most people could and would do most, if not all, of the things they say their grandparents did if they needed to in order to support and protect their families.
My maternal grandfather had lost both eyes in two separate accidents before he was thirty. He and my grandmother raised 5 children at the beginning of the 20th century to become well adjusted productive members of society. They had several endeavors to support the family including a cafe and a boarding house. Tom (grandfather) would not wear dark glasses to hide his damaged eyes because he got around so well people might claim he was faking blindness.
My advice is do not sell yourself short. You could wring a chickens neck, slaughter hogs, sew clothes, cook without microwaves, etc IF you had too.