If you grew up with tacos as a meal, you've probably come to associate ground beef (or, if your family was more progressive, ground turkey or chicken) with tacos, along with a kit from Old El Paso or Ortega.  I don't blame you, so did I.  The other night, however, I was watching Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, and Guy Fieri went to a restaurant whose coup de grace was a shredded beef taco.  In fact, so famous was that shredded beef taco, that people went there specifically for it.

That was good enough for me.  Not to go to the restaurant, but to decide that I wanted some.  As is usually the case with my kitchen inspiration, I thought about how to make it in my slow cooker.  If you're wondering why, you have to understand that I work from 10:30am to 6:30pm.  By the time I get home, I have no time to cook if I want to eat at a reasonable time before my 11:00pm bedtime, so I need to come up with something that's easy, and that's exactly what this recipe is.  You prepare it the night before, cook it while you're at work, then come home and have dinner with minimal preparation.

Without further ado, here's what it takes to make some pretty awesome shredded beef tacos with very little effort.

Ingredients

• 1 2.25 - 2.5 lb. Brisket, First Cut (Flat Cut) or Second Cut (Triangle Cut).  First Cut is leaner and tougher, but since you're putting it in a slow cooker and shredding it afterward, either cut will work equally well.
• 1 Cup McCormick Taco Seasoning (I use McCormick for three reasons: 1: it's easy to get a huge container of it at Costco, 2: it has a lot of salt in it so when it cooks down there's plenty of flavor left, and 3: it has these awesome onion flakes in it that provide excellent flavor)
• 4 Cups Water
• 1 Box of your favorite Taco Shells (I highly recommend the ones from Trader Joe's)
• Shredded cheddar cheese, taco sauce, etc, for topping.

Directions

1.  In a large enough bowl, mix the water and taco seasoning thoroughly.  I'm assuming you could use a whole bunch of packets of seasoning from the store, but it would be a pain in the butt to open all those packages.  The other option would be to make your own seasoning, and I've done it in the past using this recipe.

2.  Place the brisket in your slow cooker's bowl, then cover it with the sauce, place the cover on it, then put it in the fridge overnight.  I recommend doing this in an effort to have some of the seasoning mixture soak into the brisket overnight.

3.  Place the bowl of the slow cooker back on the heating element and cook for 10 hours at low temperature.  Your brisket should look like the picture below when it's done.

4.  With two forks, tear the meat into shreds, then place the meat in taco shells and top with your favorite toppings.  Me?  I prefer cheddar cheese alone, but that I'll leave up to you.

Honestly?  I'm a huge fan of tacos.  Aside from Pizza, I can't think of a single food I like as much as tacos, and now that I've had these, I never want the "ground turkey" type ever again.  These are clearly more expensive to make, but they are so much more delicious I can't even begin to tell you.  If Tacos are your thing, you owe it to yourself to give these a try and they'll probably spoil you for the "Taco Bell" style tacos forever!

Bon Apetit!