Butternut Squash Tacos

I don’t think I have ever met anyone who doesn’t like tacos.

What’s not to love?  It is a complete meal in your hand.  You get protein, veggies, dairy and incredible taste!

Tacos recipes have also been done to death.  Which is why I am, of course, giving you a taco recipe.  (I like to be part of the group ;-))

I wanted to have a lot of protein in my tacos without necessarily using beans since I know they don’t always agree with everybody.  Enough said.  You all see where I am going with this.

So I am turning to something that helped make my sloppy Joe recipe the protein powerhouse that it is…

Tofu!  Okay.  Stop making that face.  It’s invisible tofu.  The kind no-one will suspect is there.  You can tell them it is turkey if they get suspicious.  Really.  It is that hard to detect.  It is like stealth tofu.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups butternut squash cubes (buy already cubed or make your own by peeling a squash and cubing it)
• 4 green onions (root end cut off)
• 1 cup roughly chopped red onion (about 1/2 of a medium onion)
• 1 cup corn (frozen is more than fine here- no defrosting necessary)
• 1 (15.5 oz) extra firm tofu, removed from container and drained (no need to press it), then wrapped in plastic wrap and put in the freezer for at least a few hours (you can do this the day ahead)
• (up to) 1 Tablespoon taco seasoning

Directions:

1. Put squash and both onions into a food processor and pulse till riced (fairly large “rice”, but definitely not large chunks.  I did 16-20 fairly long pulses to get the desired results.
2. Heat a bit of oil in a large frying pan over medium heat.  Add the squash and onion mixture, sprinkle with salt and saute for 5-10 minutes, stirring frequently.  (if you riced the squash into really small pieces, 5 minutes is probably all you need.  You don’t want it fully cooked at this point, but just starting to get tender.)
3. Meanwhile, grate the tofu using the large holes of a grater.  You can grate it frozen, which will result in finer, thiner strands of the tofu (it will look brown when it comes out of the freezer, but it will grate white–no idea why, but it is magic) or you can defrost it for a few hours in the fridge and it will be more of a larger, crumbly grate.  Totally personal choice.
4. Add the tofu, frozen corn and taco seasoning, mix to combine with the squash and cook the mixture another 5-10 minutes till squash is al dente and corn is warmed through.  You might need to turn the heat down a bit here.
5. Taste to adjust seasonings like salt and taco spices.

Enjoy!

Serving suggestions:

Top with shredded cabbage instead of lettuce for an extra boost, chopped tomatoes, avocado,  jalapeños and my avocado coconut cream sauce or one of my queso sauces.