These marinated Carne Asada Street Tacos are fabulous and full-flavored – they’re worth the effort of marinating and waiting for!
If there’s one thing I love come summer time, it’s street food. Give me some Carne Asada Street Tacos and you’ll see me nom-noming all day long. Face-plant right here.
Every year, I look forward to spring breaking, sunny skies (yeah, no more rain!) and street fairs. And, with street fairs, you get street tacos! Can I get a w00t?
As you can imagine, here in Seattle, we have a lot of street fairs, food fests, tastings – anything to do with fun, street food and food trucks. Now you know where you can find me. Getting some authentic grub on at the mobile street taco truck. 🙂
The good news is, you don’t have to wait for a street fair or food festival to get the same taste at home.
With a little bit of time (for the meat to marinade and the vegetables to roast), you can make amazing street tacos at home.
Once your vegetables are roasted, you will want to let them cool, then blitz them in your blender until smooth. I highly recommend you let the roasted vegetables cool a bit before adding them to the blender. If not, the heat from the vegetables causes pressure to build up and can cause the blender lid to pop off – getting hot vegetables everywhere and potentially scalding you!
Trust me on this one – unfortunately, I know this from personal experience. Now, I always let them cool down first AND I cover the lid with a kitchen towel and hold the lid down while blending. Lesson learned.
What makes these Carne Asada Street Tacos so amazing is a mixture of roasted vegetables, and when pureed with the toasted New Mexico Chile Pods it turns it into a rich, smoky salsa that adds an incredible depth of flavor to the tacos. The chile pods are one of my favorite ingredients to use in Mexican cooking!
If you like your tacos with an extra bit of a kick (you know I do!), then add jalapenos to your mix of onion, garlic and tomatoes.
These Carne Asada Street Tacos also have an amazing mix of spices to accompany the smoky salsa that you will just love – spices like cumin, chili powder, paprika and cilantro… I mean, yum, right?
Enjoy!
Street Tacos - Carne Asada Style
Ingredients
Meat (Marinade) Preparation
- 3 pounds flank steak
- 1/4 cup white vinegar
- 1/3 cup soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon garlic minced
- 1/3 cup orange juice
- 1/3 cup olive oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon ground white pepper
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon paprika
Sauce Preparation
- 2 large tomatoes chopped
- 2 jalapeno peppers chopped
- 1 white onion quartered
- 8 cloves garlic peeled
- 4 dried New Mexico chile pods
- salt and pepper to taste
Relish Preparation
- 1 white onion chopped
- 1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
- 1 lime juiced
Taco Preparation
- 1 32 ounce package corn tortillas
- 2 cups grated cotija cheese optional
- 2 limes cut into wedges
Instructions
- Lay the flank steak in a large glass baking dish. In a medium bowl, whisk together the white vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, orange juice, and olive oil. Season with salt, black pepper, white pepper, garlic powder, chili powder, oregano, cumin and paprika. Whisk until thoroughly mixed. Pour over the flank steak and turn over once to coat both sides. Cover with plastic wrap, and marinate in the refrigerator for 1 to 8 hours.
- Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. Toast the chile pods in the skillet for a few minutes, then remove them and place them in a bowl of water, setting them aside and letting them soak for 30 minutes.
- While the chiles are soaking, preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). Prep the tomatoes, 1 onion, jalapenos, and garlic cloves and place them on a baking sheet. Roast in the oven for about 20 minutes, until toasted but not burnt. Remove and place the roasted vegetables, and soaked chile pods into a blender or food processor and puree until smooth. Season with salt and pepper, if desired.
- In a small bowl, stir together 1 chopped white onion, cilantro, and the juice of 1 lime. Set aside to use as a relish for the tacos.
- Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Cut the marinated flank steak into bite-size pieces or strips. Cook in the olive oil, stirring constantly, until the meat is cooked through and most of the liquid has evaporated.
- Warm the tortillas in a skillet for about a minute on each side to make them pliable. (Tortillas may also be warmed in a microwave oven). Arrange and stack two corn tortillas on a plate, and layer with steak, onion relish and a large spoonful of pureed salsa. Garnish with cotija cheese. Enjoy!
Recipe adapted from AllRecipes @ Taqueria Style Tacos.
Carne Asada Street Tacos
Interested in more Mexican recipes?
- Tropical Chicken Tacos from Inspiration Kitchen
- Breakfast Tacos from Recipe Girl
- Grilled Mexican Street Corn Salad from Flavor The Moments
- Caramelized Pork Tacos with Pineapple Salsa from Pinch Of Yum
- Blackened Shrimp Tacos with Queso Fresco from Inspiration Kitchen
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