Taco Pie

Instead of taking the slow route into my family food heritage and making something obscure, we are jumping into the deep end.

To me, Taco Pie is one of a handful of recipes that are iconic in my father’s side of the family. The matriarch of our family was Joyce; whom we all called Granny. Funnily enough, this nickname was her choice and recipes from her collection will be tagged with both for ease of searching.

One Christmas shortly before she passed, Granny gave all her grandchildren a cookbook called “Granny’s Cookbook for [insert name]”. She hand embroidered the cover, typed out all of the recipes on an old word processor, and it is filled with many of my favorite recipes that she made when I was growing up. For most of my time owning this cookbook, the only thing that I have made from it was the lefse recipe and after making a few things from Nick’s family, I decided to break out the big guns: Taco Pie. I remember this being the main dinner when we would visit because Granny would save the special meals for when we were all there. I would stay with them quite a bit on my own and Taco Pie was never on the menu during these smaller visits.

After Granny passed, the cousins started getting together every November to make Lefse for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We have been doing this for about 10 years now and I think that this tradition sprang up from our need to have this holiday treat and to hold on to Granny’s memory. Every year we have evolved our process, but there are some constants: I bring the lefse dough, someone else brings the overnight cookies, and we have Taco Pie for lunch.

The original recipe is not glamorous. AT. ALL. In reading the ingredients and talking to people about it, I have received some odd looks, and I have to convince them that this really is good. Also, like all Americanized taco recipes, it is very customizable and can barely be called taco in the traditional sense. Following the original instructions will give you a tasty pie and you can very the spice level based on the type of salsa (or catsup) you use. For slightly healthier versions, use ground turkey or chicken instead of beef. The crescent roll crust is actually optional and not having the crust does take out a bunch of calories and is an easy way to make it gluten free. There are also easy substitutions that can be made to make it vegetarian (meatless ground meat, dairy free cheese, etc).

For the first attempt at Gluten Free Taco Pie, all I did was leave out the crescent roll crust. It was pretty good, but we felt that there was definite room for improvement. The second attempt is much more of an Original Burrow Creation (I just made that up). I picked up a gluten free pie crust at the local grocery store. My Granny was a HUGE fan of shortcuts in cooking, so I felt like this was in keeping with the spirit of the recipe. I also really dislike making gluten free pie crusts and so far every one I have made has been awful- they are crumbly, don’t roll out, and the taste isn’t much better than store bought. I sauteed some diced onions and peppers and added the ground turkey to brown (don’t forget to spice your meat). I used one of our homemade salsas from last fall that had Poblano and Fatalii peppers in it (just a little heat) and added corn and black beans. That all went on top of the crust and crushed chips. I topped it with a store bought Mexican Cheese mix and finished with a final layer of crushed chips. We served it with more salsa, sour cream, and lettuce, but you can use any of your favorite taco toppings.

Enjoy making this one your own!