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Mmmmm Tacos. We probably eat some version of tacos at least twice a week in the sloth kitchen. Two reasons:

1. Sloth friendly- fast and easy with these sloth shortcuts!
2. YUM.

Did I mention yum? Easily my favorite food. They can also be customized to everyone’s different tastes, and they can be dairy free and/or gluten free if you want (see recipe notes)

There are 5 important components:

The Spices.
The Lime Juice.
The Chipotle Peppers.
The Crispiness (yes, an ingredient).
The Tacos!

My favorite way to make these is in the crockpot. You can use an inexpensive cut of meat (chuck or a roast) that needs a long cook time to get tender, and let it get nice and cozy with all it’s spice friends while it cooks in your crockpot for you all day. Minimal work, and SO GOOD. The only down side (or up side?) is that you smell it all afternoon, wafting out of your kitchen, if you’re at home, and it makes me so hungry. Your people (or yourself) might get mad at you because it’s not ready to eat yet.

The Spices

First, some spices. There’s no chopped vegetables cooking along with the meat in this recipe, so we need some spices to do the heavy lifting.

Chili Powder.

Cumin.

Oregano.

Garlic Powder.

Onion Powder.

Black Pepper.

Salt.

More salt than you think you need. I added more than what’s pictured after a few hours of cooking.

The Lime Juice

Add a squeeze of lime juice to the crockpot with the meat- about a tablespoon of bottled lime juice or the juice from one or two small limes. I had fresh limes today, but use whatever you have. You do you. Lime and chili peppers- is there a better flavor combination??

The VIP Chipotle Peppers

Let’s talk about the canned chipotle peppers for a sec. This is the VIP of this recipe. This stands for Very Important Pepper.

Don’t leave it out! We need this spicy, smoky, rich flavor in our barbacoa. However, one can has TON of peppers and sauce. Two things.

If you dump the whole can in (ummm am I the only one that’s done this?) IT IS VERY SPICY. Oops. Unless you really like spicy food… probably don’t do this.

If you only use one or two peppers, you have about 80% of the can left. I would end up wasting the rest of the can unless I made 47 other chipotle pepper recipes that week.

My solution? Freeze it. When I open a new can, I freeze one pepper and a few tablespoons of the adobo sauce in a little ziplock bag (the snack size bags). I put these little bags in a bigger ziplock bag that I label and I can pull one or two out when I need some chipotle peppers in my life a recipe. I have a little spot in my freezer dedicated to these leftover peppers (I also do this with tomato paste, pumpkin puree, etc…) This way, I am never without some peppers to use in tacos!

Into the crockpot! Meat, spices, lime juice, a couple chipotle peppers in their sauce. THAT’S IT. Put the lid on, walk way, and let your crockpot do it’s thing. When the meat is cooked (8 hours on low or 4 hours on high), shred it with two forks in the crockpot.

The Crispiness

I am including this as an ingredient. Put your oven on broil and spread out a layer of the meat on a rimmed sheet pan. Pro tip- line that bad boy with foil or parchment paper so your life is easier when you clean up. Broil the meat 5 or so minutes, until it starts to crisp up. I like to scoop some of the juice in the crockpot onto it, and then spritz it with a little spray oil.

This part is optional, but I oh so strongly beg you to do it. The little bit of texture and crispiness it adds is worth the extra 5 minutes. It also helps the sauce not be too runny and drip out of your taco and onto your shirt. Or plate. Whatever.

The Tacos

You’ve been smelling this ding dang barbacoa meat cooking in the crockpot all day and now it’s finally time to EAT. If you’re like me, you want to skip the last steps and get to the good part- THE TACOS. Make sure you heat up your corn tortillas though, or they’re going to split on you, and all your taco insides will fall out, and it’s a very sad time. Don’t let it happen to you. I wrap my tortillas (2 or 5 or 10 or however many you plan on eating) in a towel and microwave until they’re warm.

Chop up your radish, onion, limes, and cilantro (do this while the crispiness is happening) and line them up on the cutting board like so. You don’t need fancy bowls – or- if that makes you happy, go for it. I don’t like dishes, so I do this and say that it’s artsy.

Get a warm tortilla and add some of your crispy, spicy, smoky barbacoa meat. Top it with some chopped radish, onion, and a good green salsa- this one is my favorite. You could add cheese – some cojita cheese would be yummy – but these tacos really don’t need it. Serve it with a lime wedge, green salsa, and maybe some chips and salsa. And a margarita.

Sloth Shortcuts

The Sloth Shortcuts for this recipe involve both Past Sloth You and Future Sloth You, but here they are:

• Sloth Shortcut #1: This one’s requires some prepping beforehand OR the ability to time travel… Use meat that Past Sloth You has already trimmed, chopped, and frozen. If you can pull this out of the freezer, the prep for this recipe is about 1 minute! When I buy meat, I like to prep it ready to use in recipes — not cook it, just trim it down and freeze it in manageable portions. See my freezer cooking post, coming soon!

• Sloth Shortcut #2: Again with the time traveling to Past Sloth You (or just do this for next time!) Freeze the rest of your can of chipotle adobo peppers in 1-2 peppers portions with some sauce in a bag – pull out however many you need!

• Sloth Shortcut #3: Make more than you think you need and freeze the leftovers! Pull it out of the freezer on a Tuesday when you are losing your mind at 5pm and have amazing tacos with a margarita. Future Sloth You already thanks you.