How to Make Shrimp Tacos & Shrimp Taco Sauce

Last Updated on 22nd April 2022 by

Shrimp tacos are such a superb treat that I usually reserve for the weekend. The combination of spicy, creamy, crunchy, and chewy just works together so well to make a dish that really excites the taste buds.

What I absolutely love about tacos, burritos, and other similar dishes is that there are so many ways to make them. You can change out the fillings for whatever you want to suit your tastes.

With shrimp tacos, there are a few common ingredients you’ll find in most tacos of this kind, but if there’s anything in the recipe I’ll give you later on that you don’t like, feel free to switch it out for something you do like.

What Goes on a Shrimp Taco?

While there are plenty of different things you could put on your shrimp tacos, they usually have shrimp (of course), shrimp taco sauce, and coleslaw. The coleslaw may be homemade or prepackaged. Either one works just fine, and any kind of coleslaw is perfect for these tacos.

I know some people use Spanish rice or refried beans on their shrimp tacos, but these are not traditional components.
When made properly and traditionally, shrimp tacos can be pretty healthy, though not very filling. You’ll probably need to make a few of them for each person you’re making them for.

You’ll probably want to put some seasonings on your shrimp tacos as well to make it more flavorful. Cilantro, lime juice, and taco seasoning are all good additions, and you can add others or change some of these out, if you like.

A lot of times, the coleslaw is mixed with a sauce made from yogurt to make it moist and hold everything together. This keeps the coleslaw from falling out of the loose soft shell tortillas.
Lastly, you’ll need soft shell tortillas.

You can make shrimp tacos with crunchy corn tortillas, but traditionally, you’ll take a soft shell tortilla and fold it in the same shape as a taco for this dish.

How to Make Shrimp Taco

Now that you know what to put on shrimp taco, let’s talk about how to make it. You can put shrimp tacos together from base ingredients in just a few minutes.

So, there’s not a lot of prep time or planning that needs to go into it. Even if you’re making the shrimp from frozen, it doesn’t take them long to thaw out and cook up.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound of raw, peeled shrimp
• 1 teaspoon of garlic powder
• 14-ounce bag of coleslaw
• 1 tablespoon of taco seasoning
• ½ bunch of chopped cilantro
• Oil for frying
• 9 soft corn tortillas
• Shrimp taco sauce

Directions:

1. Cook up the shrimp in a frying pan with a little oil. Once the shrimp starts to turn translucent and change color, it’s all done cooking.
2. Add the coleslaw to your tortilla shells and then the shrimp on top of that. Sprinkle on your other seasonings and top with shrimp taco sauce.

You can warm the tortillas before you make this up or leave them cold. Some people will add guacamole to the mix or little black pepper to season.

How to Make Shrimp Taco Sauce

You can buy shrimp taco sauce at the grocery that’s already prepared for you and save yourself some trouble, or you can make it at home. If you’re making it yourself, you’ll be able to control the ingredients in better, determining what’s goes in there and how healthy it is.

Here is a recipe for shrimp taco sauce you can use, and you can find all sorts of other ones as well if you do a little searching online.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of plain yogurt
• Juice from one lime
• 1/2 teaspoon of taco seasoning
• 1 pinch of cayenne pepper
• 1/4 cup of mayonnaise
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 1 pinch of ground black pepper

Directions:

1. Combine all of your ingredients together in a mixing bowl.
2. Once combined, store your sauce in the refrigerator until it’s ready to be added to the tacos.

How Many Calories in Shrimp Taco?

Shrimp tacos can be fairly healthy, depending on how you make them. The ingredients you use will play a big part in determining how many calories these tacos have.

I recommend using healthy oil like avocado oil for cooking your shrimp in. You can also make the sauce using healthy ingredients like avocado mayonnaise rather than traditional mayonnaise.

The average shrimp taco has about 226 calories, but how much you end up with for your shrimp tacos you make at home will vary based on what you’re putting in them. You can make some substitutions and changes to increase or decrease the calorie count.

Knowing how to make shrimp tacos with taco seasoning it gives you a way to control your calorie consumption by putting the ingredients in your hands.

You can determine how fatty each ingredient is, how healthy it is, and what it’s made from. you can pick out each ingredient by hand, choosing low calorie, low fat, and low sodium components.

How to Make Shrimp Taco Salad

Shrimp taco salad can simply be the shrimp taco shredded up and placed into a bowl. You can use the taco shrimp sauce as dressing or add some other ingredients to make it more of a salad.

Coleslaw is a salad on its own, and with a little shrimp and shredded tortilla shell in it, it can be even more appealing.

You can use the tortilla shell as a bowl to serve your salad in, or you can completely replace the tortilla shell with tortilla chips. You can break the chips up small to make them bite size.

Feel free to add some other vegetables or other ingredients when you’re making shrimp taco salad, including corn, avocado slices, black olives, jalapenos, black beans, and more. Shred a little cheese on top of it to make a perfect salad you’ll want to have over and over again.

Pauline

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I'm Pauline, a mother of four grown children, my passion for cooking stemmed from the joy i get cooking for my family. I love to try new dishes, especially when dining out but creating and sharing my own recipes is my favourite thing to do!

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