Easy Eats

I usually like to keep one “Meal in a Box” type of dinner kit in the house for when I am super tired and need to feed the pack of ravenous hyenas I live with house. So when I saw this 12 taco dinner kit on sale for $2.50, I went for it.

Ingredients: (* = in the kit)

• 12 hard taco shells*
• 1 pouch of salsa*
• 1 seasoning mix packet*
• 1 lb of ground beef
• 2/3 cup water
• Lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese (as desired)

Directions: (mainly from the box)

1. Heat oven to 325 F.
2. Cook ground beef in skillet on medium-high until no longer pink.
3. Drain meat; stir in seasoning packet and the water.
4. Continue to cook uncovered for 3 minutes on medium-high, stirring occasionally
5. While doing step 4, chop up some lettuce and tomatoes as you like.
6. Arrange taco shells on ungreased cookie sheet so they’re not touching. Bake for 6 minutes.
7. Take shells out, and spoon in the meat, lettuce, tomatoes, salsa, and any cheese you got.
8. Serve!

Box Front	Directions	Box Contents
Step 2	Step 4	Step 5
Step 5	Step 6	Yum.

Cost:
Like mentioned, the kit cost $2.50. The ground beef was $3. The lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese would depend on if you had any extra laying around (ours was from our garden), I’ll estimate $2. That’s 7.50 for 12 tacos, which can feed 3-4 people, not bad.

Final comments:
This isn’t exactly health food, and I’m sure the “seasoning mix” has some funky stuff in it, but for a Meal in a Box it was pretty tasty. The bad parts are that you have to remember to buy the meat separately, and it still required some chopping of the lettuce and tomatoes. At least we always have some shredded cheese around, since melted cheese makes anything taste better. Overall, I’d buy it again as a backup dinner.

Final Ratings:
Taste: 4/5
Value: 4/5
Convenience 3/5