Homemade Taco Seasoning

I am a firm believer in the philosophy "Everything in moderation." With that said, I am also conscientious of certain things that I eat (or that I serve The Mister), especially the amount of salt we take in. Within the last year, I have become a smarter consumer, reading more and more product labels. And we can get tons of salt in surprising places! Taco seasoning packets were great for convenience for me, but when I read the label I was surprised that there was so much salt AND I didn't even know what a lot of the stuff on the ingredients list was. So I did my due diligence and mixed up my own.

I like to make the taco seasoning in bulk. And I like to save empty spice containers to save my own mixes in (that is how my taco seasoning ended up in a nice glass spice container). There are a lot of recipes out there for homemade taco seasoning. I use my seasoning mix for all tex mex recipes. Queso gets a little dash, fajitas are rubbed down with 2 tablespoons, and a pound of ground beef gets a tablespoon of seasoning.

Here is the Taco Seasoning Mix (for bulk):

1/4 cup chili powder
1/4 Tbs cayenne pepper
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried minced onion flakes
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp oregano
3 tsp paprika
2 Tbs cumin
1 Tbs black pepper
1/2 Tbs coarse sea salt


I prefer the shaken, not stirred method no mixing these spices together. What was awesome about that is before I had a nice spice container, I just labeled a ziplock with "Tex Mex Spice mix" and scooped as I needed it.  A tip I read at a few different places and didn't believe it until I tried it is to add 1 tablespoon of regular, boring all purpose flour to ground meat for tacos to let these spices stick better to the meat so you get more flavor.

We use this mix A LOT at our house. I love some delicious tex mex.