Taco salad live demo!

Hello everyone, come on in, thank you so much for joining, we'll get started in just a moment. Happy Fri-yay, as we say. We'll give it a minute to come, to let everybody come on in. Hope everybody is doing well, hope everybody is looking forward to the weekend. Today I am making lunch, I may or may not eat right away, I have a late breakfast, so I'm going to show you guys a meal prep option that I do for taco salad. I think it's pretty easy, but you know what, not everybody does, so I'm here to share and I'd love for you guys to share with me what tips and tricks you have. Let's go ahead and get started. I've done that through getting tested for food sensitivities, hello, hello, and I have a list of foods that I can have, and I have a list of foods that I avoid. So the whole Maggie the substitute teacher thing is about me substituting and coming up with some hacks that I want to share with you guys. So today for lunch I'm making a taco salad, pretty straightforward, but I've got a couple things that I do differently that I'll share with you guys. That actually keeps the heat inside and lets it cook faster. Alright, so we're going to have our heat on like a medium high. Alright, so let me cut this open, hope everybody's doing well. So happy that you're joining, whether you're joining live or you're joining on the replay. If you don't eat meat, you can probably do some type of plant substitute, but I do eat beef, so I just put the ground meat directly into the skillet. I don't put any oil down first because for me, you know, ground meat, especially ground beef, is going to have, you know, enough fat that comes off already. Alright, so let me throw this away, wash my hands, and I know the instructions say to like brown the ground beef first, I think you're supposed to drain it, then add the seasoning, and add water. I'm not doing all that. Y'all, I'm not a chef, I'm just a home cook, and I do what works for me. So I suggest, you know, we all do what works for you. So while the ground beef is in there, I am using, this is just McCormick taco seasoning. You can actually make your own, I've seen a recipe for it, but I am using the taco seasoning in the pack. This is something that I bought at Walmart, you can buy like a 12 pack and have it on hand. And literally, even before the meat goes down, I'm going to go ahead and put the seasoning on top, and I'm just going to cook it all together. I'm going to save a step. Alright, I'll turn it down a little bit, kind of to a medium, and then I'm going to go in there and get everything all mixed together. I am using, this is like, I don't know what it's called, I think this is Pampered Chef, but it's helpful for me to kind of get in there and break up ground meat. Alright, browning ground beef is pretty simple, you just want to keep it moving so that it doesn't burn, but it's pretty straightforward. Alright, we're going to let that cook, and again, that's the ground beef with the seasoning. I am going to put the top on it because it helps it to cook faster. And then I'm going to drain it after. I'll show you guys the little hacks that I do. While that's cooking, I am going to drink a little bit of this sweet tea that I want to show you guys. I have a hack, if you like sweet tea, I have cut sugar out of my diet, and I feel amazing. But if you like sweet tea, I've got something that might be helpful for you guys. I had never heard of this brand, and nothing here is sponsored, I'm just sharing with you guys. Southern Sweet, they actually have all kinds of different flavored teas that are cold brewed and already sweetened. So you can see here, I bought the little mason jar, but you don't have to buy their mason jar, you can put it in a glass. Literally, you take the tea bag out, and this one is the Blackberry. So you can see here, they come individually packaged for the little ones, or they even have the family size. And literally all you do is you rip open a pack, whatever flavor that you like. They have peach, they have strawberry, they have everything. And you put it in a glass with cold water, and then you can see here, it literally just cold brews. And then if it was a glass that didn't have a top, you just take the tea bag and kind of dunk it a couple times to incorporate it. I just turn it upside down. And it is sweetened with superlose, which is Splenda. So if you don't use Splenda, then you won't like it. But for me, it's a great option because I like to stay hydrated. And I'll show you guys, I also put the alkaline drops in there. Alright, so our ground beef is browning nicely. Since this is just the regular lean, there is some oil in there that I am going to drain. And y'all, I have kind of a low budget way of draining. I'll tell you what I'm doing. But hey, it's worked for me. I'm just a home cook. This is something that you can make in a big batch. And I'm going to show you guys how I plate it. And I'm also going to show you guys how to pack it for grab and go. Alright, clean as we go. So I shared with you guys that my test results showed that I needed to have more alkaline water because water was just going through me instead of staying to hydrate me. So before I put my teabag in there, I did put a couple of these alkaline drops. I've gotten this from Amazon. I've shared it with you guys. I put it in everything before I make it. Just a couple drops, coffee, bottled water, teas, whatever. Alright, so for the taco salad, mine is pretty basic. You can get as fancy as you want, but I use the ingredients that have been approved for me. So we're going to start with lettuce. I just have some romaine here. I don't eat iceberg lettuce. That's not on my plan because I was told iceberg lettuce, even though it's very common, is mostly water. And so the lettuce that I use, you know, I use spinach in salads or romaine, butter lettuce is also very good. Anything that's got basically more nutrition. So we've got our lettuce here. I'm going to turn this down. Alright. So let me go ahead and get this drained. And then I'm just going to leave it on the stove because the beef is done. It doesn't take long at all. And again, I just cooked the beef with the taco seasoning already. No extra water, none of that. Alright. So everybody has their own little hacks. This is just probably like a vegetable strainer or washer. Literally, guys, I'm going to sit this over the top of my trash can. Don't do this. You know, it's probably not the safest, but I'm going to take the pan with some towels and I'm going to pour the beef into this so that the grease can drain down. Only do this if you have stuff in your trash. But this is how I drain and then I put it back in the pan so it can stay in warm. It's not, you know, not the best method, but it's my method. Alright, so I'm going to turn this off. I'll bring it over to you guys to see. Alright, so we've got our ground meat here, as you can see, and lots of oil that we need to get rid of. And I cooked it with the taco seasoning already. So literally, I'm just shaking it into that little strainer. And then I set the pan back down onto the counter and pick up the strainer and pour the meat back in. That's how I strain everything that they do. So now I was able to get rid of most of the excess oil. So our ground beef is done. I'm just going to leave it here with the top on because we're pretty much ready to plate our salad. I should have been prepping my veggies. So let's go ahead and get started with that. Alright, so we're going to use romaine and I think I will use this whole. It's not a head of lettuce. Hey, guys. Welcome. I guess these things called it's not a head. It's a leaf. It's whatever. Only washing the part that I need again. And thank you for the thumbs up, everyone. I am going to plate a taco salad and I'm going to pack a taco salad. So you guys can see both options. So let me rinse this off. All right. Try to get all this water off, you know, the lettuce. So we get the juices from the meat. All right. I got a couple of brown pieces. I'm just going to tear those off. All right. So we've got our lettuce and I'm just going to do a couple of rough chops and then show you guys what we have. So we have romaine here. That's enough for two salads. Every kitchen needs a good chef's knife. All right. And you could tear it. You could chop it. Whatever works for you. You just want to get pieces that, you know, you can put on a fork and put in your mouth. That's basically it. So here's our lettuce. So that's going to be the base of the salad. So we'll do them both at the same time. So we'll go with these nice greens on a plate. And then we'll do some in the container. No, not because we don't want them to, those go in a Ziploc bag. All right. So on my plate so far, we have a nice set of lettuce. Hi, Tom. Thank you so much for joining. So we've got our romaine. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to go ahead and put the ground beef over top. My salad is pretty basic. Y'all can get as fancy as you want, but I don't do corn, avocado, beans, any of that. It's going to be pretty basic, but it'll be nice. So this was one pound of ground beef and my lunch portion is eight ounces. So I'm pretty liberal with the protein here. So I'll do half on my salad and then I'm going to do half on my to-go. So you guys can see both. All right. So you can see here and here's the key. I like to put the cheese on my meat while it's still warm so that it melts down. And if you guys were watching a few videos ago, I showed you I am cow dairy free. So this is the shredded pepper jack goats cheese. I love it. Like I told you, I use it on everything. So I'm going to show you guys what we have so far on the plate. Romaine and we have ground beef already seasoned. We did that in one pan and the goat's milk cheese. So now for the packable one, while that melts down, I'm going to go ahead and get the rest of this ground beef in my meal prep container. I have made this like a large batch and that way I have a salad that's ready to go. I work from home, thankfully. And sometimes I'm back to back in meetings. Today was a little bit lighter. So I actually have time to cook. We all like a fresh cooked meal. But if I don't have time to cook, then I'll pack this up. All right. So in my prep bowl, I've moved my ground beef as you guys can see. And it's still hot, but I've moved it to the side. All right. Clean as we go. So we're done with our ground beef. I don't rinse anything. My dishwasher has a disposal, so I just put it directly in there and it does the job. Like I said before, I grew up washing dishes by hand and I vowed when I got my own home. I was going to use the dishwasher. All right. So now, as you guys can see, our taco salad that I'm going to eat is melting a little bit. So what I'm going to do with the rest of the meal prep one, let's just get our ingredients. And the key so that you have this whole salad experience on days that you're not eating it fresh, you want to pack your ingredients kind of separate. So you can just assemble it. So I'm going to take a Ziploc bag and put the rest of the romaine that's going for my salad. Let's say I'll eat this tomorrow inside a Ziploc bag. So we've got our meat and you're going to put your lettuce in separate from the meat. I'll make it and then I'll kind of disassemble it so it can cool down. But literally what you do for your prep is that you go ahead and put your salad in next to your meat. You see what I'm doing? So I'm building it together. All right. So now we're done with our cutting board. We're going to do some fresh pico, which I bought already at Walmart. The weather is changing here, so I need to blow my nose. One second, guys. I'm going to wash my hands. I don't know if anyone else suffers from allergies, but... All right. All right. Let's clean our hands and pick back up. So now I'm going to put some pico on my salad. This is just Walmart. I love Latin flavors. If you don't like pico or you don't like tomato, I guess it's optional. You can put whatever you want on your salad. I'm just showing you guys what I do. And I'm pretty liberal with it because I love the flavors. If you have like fresh salsa, you can do that too. I should look and see if I have fresh salsa. I'll show you guys what we have. So now we've added the fresh pico on top of our romaine, warm ground beef, shredded goat cheese, and the pico. And then what I do for the packable one, I love these little containers. This one is the disposable one. If you've eaten any kind of takeout or gone to any kind of salad bar, they have these containers. You can get these at the Dollar Tree in a sleeve of like 50. You use them once and then you hopefully recycle them. But if you don't want to do that, these you can also get at the Dollar Tree. This is the same kind of size and it has a reusable plastic, a little bit more sturdy with a top. So what I do is I put my cheese and my pico inside these containers when I'm building my meal prep option salad. So I'm just scooping it in here and I'm going to show you guys. I got one of each. So we've got our fresh pico. This could be salsa. This could be whatever you want to assemble for your taco salad. And literally after our ground beef and our lettuce, I literally just put it in there. You can see I'm building kind of like a lunchable. All right, so we're done with the pico. All right, and then lastly, cheese. I've got a little bit of shredded goat's cheese left and I'm going to put this in the other container for my meal prep salad. And I'm just making one to show you guys. But you can literally, I've seen pictures online where people make a whole like counter full of this stuff. You just have to double and triple your ingredients. But I bought a one pound log of ground beef. And so if I'm eating eight ounces, one pound is 16 ounces. So that's half. So I'm eating half and I'm packing half. Not sure what everybody's having for lunch today. Hopefully this is helpful. I'm taking you guys on my journey. I'm trying to get 10 pounds more off just in the month of March. I've got some plans for April and the holidays are over. So no reason why we can't get it together, right? That's what my metabolic specialist tells me when I'm enjoying myself too much. Okay, get it together. All right, so you guys can see here I kind of packed it in. This is the shredded goat's cheese. It could be your Mexican blend cheese. It could be anything that you like. And literally, I'm adding it to my container. So if you remember, we started with our ground beef. We started with then I have lettuce. I've got fresh pico in the back. And I've got the shredded goat's cheese. That's almost it. What is a taco salad without, you know, a taco shell or tortillas, right? I don't eat that. I'm sensitive. Sorry, y'all. I'm just cleaning. I'm sensitive to grains. So what I do instead, I shared this with you guys before. I know this flavor says pecan. That's what I have. But Blue Diamond, this is the almond brand. They make a grain-free cracker. They have ranch flavor, which I think was in the thumbnail. They have all kinds of different flavors. Crunchmaster. One day I'll make my own tortilla chips from the Quesada tortillas. But literally, my portion of these is 16 per day. And this is my second and last meal of the day. I just made my faux blueberry pancakes earlier. And that's it. So this is going to be my taco shell, if you will, because we like the texture, right, when we're eating Latin flavors. So I'm just going to count. 13, 14, 15, 16. All right. Not sure if you guys can see, but I'm going to scoop into this and bite. But this is basically the meal that I'm going to eat. And then I do the same thing and put them in a Ziploc bag. I don't think I have 16 left, so I'll just put them all in here. I love these little small Ziploc bags, the snack size, because they're great for individual portions. All right. Let's see if I can just grab these and put them in here. Sometimes I count exactly. Sometimes I eyeball it. That's why I eat, you know, two meals a day. I like my meals, you know, early, because I like them kind of, you know, big. And then dinner is usually a smoothie or some hot tea or something for me. So you guys can see here I put my leftover nachos into a Ziploc bag. That way you have your portions. And then literally I'm just going to put it right here on top of the ground beef. And since everything is already in, you know, hermetically sealed, we've got our ground beef underneath, and then we've got all our toppings, our lettuce, our pico, our cheese, and our nachos. So that is all for me. If I weren't dairy sensitive, I would put like a dollop of sour cream or even Greek yogurt is a great substitute. You can do, you know what, we'll do a little bit of hot sauce. Let me do that. Just for giggles, I've got some Diablo sauce. This is completely optional. I'm just going to drizzle this on for presentation. I think it looks great. And I'm going to taste it for you guys. So this is lunch for me today. This is a taco salad, and I'm having it with my unsweet sweet tea. Again, the brand is Southern Breeze. This is a blackberry flavor. So I'm going to put my romaine up. If this were cooled already, I would just go ahead and stack these in the fridge. I just put the top on it, and you guys can see we've got our taco salad ready to go. So you can imagine if I had like four of these for each weekday, I could just grab them. And then what I do when I take it out of the fridge, literally I just take out the lettuce bag, the pico bag, and the chips. And then I have the meat at the bottom. You can either open the cheese and put it over the meat cold and microwave that together so it's all ooey gooey, or you can microwave just the meat and then put your toppings on and build it just like I did. And I just eat it out of this container. So that's something that's really helped me. If you guys are in this taco salad, I'll leave this out so it can cool. I'll put the lettuce up. And I think that is it. Let me put the hot sauce up. Start the dishwasher. But I'll eat. I didn't think I was hungry, but making this now I'm hungry. So let me taste it for you guys. Let me know what you like on your taco salad. All right, so let's get in here. So we've got – oh, crap. I always say I'm going to take a picture of this stuff, and then I just dive in there. Y'all, I'm new at this, okay? This Maggie, the Substitute Teacher, I've been doing it for about a month just to keep myself accountable and bring you guys on my journey because, you know, as we get older, we can do better. We don't have to just let things go. And that's what I'm here to do and be accountable. All right. So this is a sugar-free, grain-free, dairy-free taco salad. I should have cut my lettuce a little bit smaller. I'm going to take a bite. It's very good. I may look for some salsa, just some, like, pourable salsa because I really like the tomato flavor. But the fresh pico is good, but I would like, like, more, like, salsa. But, y'all, this is great. Give it a try. Hopefully this is helpful for you guys. I'm going to let you go and enjoy your Friday afternoon. I hope everybody has a good weekend. I will try and get back on. Let's see how the rest of the week goes and schedules and everything, ripping and running. But I appreciate you guys tuning in. Thank you for the thumbs-up, the likes. Please consider subscribing. I am Maggie, the Substitute Teacher on all platforms. I'm here to show you, I'm here to teach you how I substitute the foods I love for the foods that love me back. All right. Bye, Facebook. And goodbye, YouTube. Thank you.