Taco Tater Tot Casserole Recipe
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This scrumptious taco tater tot casserole recipe includes a layer of tater tots loaded with your favorite taco flavors, like taco seasoning, melted cheese, beef, and the toppings of your choice.
I love tacos in any form but have always had a fondness for taco casserole ever since I first remember Mama making it as a child (see her taco casserole recipe here). This taco tater tot casserole recipe is a more convenient (and a little simpler) spin on Mama’s, involving tater tots as the foundation layer. My husband, Ricky, who used to swear he didn’t like casseroles, can’t get enough of this one. I bet you’ll have plenty of takers in your house, too!
The recipe is below, but let me tell you, it’s quick and easy. You just add a layer of tater tots to the bottom of your casserole and cook your flavored ground beef before adding it on top. Then add a layer of cheese, bake it in the oven, and serve it alongside your favorite taco toppings. It’s filled with the taco flavors we know and love, but with the addition of tater tots (and who doesn’t love them?). It’s hearty, filling, and delicious.
If you want to streamline it even more, make double the taco meat (through step 2) and freeze half of it for a quick to throw together casserole next time.
Recipe Ingredients
- Frozen tater tots
- Ground beef
- Taco seasoning
- Barbecue sauce
- Shredded cheddar cheese
- Taco toppings of your choice
How to Make Taco Tater Tot Casserole Recipe
Place a layer of frozen tater tots in the bottom of an 8×8 casserole dish. Set aside.
In a large skillet, brown the ground beef until it’s no longer pink. Then add the water, taco seasoning mix, and barbecue sauce. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until thickened. It will be very saucy and that is fine.
Spoon the taco beef mixture over the tater tots. Sprinkle with shredded cheddar cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Top with your favorite taco toppings and enjoy!
Storage
- Store leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days.
- You can freeze the casserole for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight before reheating briefly in the oven.
Recipe Notes
- Here are some taco toppings you might want to add on top of your taco tater tot casserole: green onions, shredded lettuce, Pico de Gallo, salsa, hot sauce, crushed tortilla chips or tortilla chips, sour cream, olives, cilantro, and guacamole.
- You can use whatever shredded cheese you prefer or have on hand. Mexican blend, Monterey Jack, and Pepper Jack cheese would all work well.
- Think it can’t be tacos without corn and beans? Feel free to add a can of black beans or pinto beans, and either a can of corn or a cup of frozen corn kernels to your meat mixture.
- Add some spice with a can of diced green chiles.
- Want to add more flavor? Feel free to add 2 cloves of minced garlic, 1 chopped onion, and some bell pepper.
- Substitute the ground beef for ground pork or ground turkey.
Here are more terrific taco-flavored recipes:
Taco Soup (The World’s Easiest Supper)
Taco Pizza – Fast, Fresh, Delicious!
Sweet Potato and Black Bean Tacos
Ingredients
- 1 bag frozen tater tots small bag, you won't need them all
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 2 packets taco seasoning mix
- 1.5 cups water
- 1/2 cup barbecue sauce
- 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese I use sharp
- Taco toppings of your choice
Instructions
- Place a layer of frozen tater tots in the bottom of an 8x8 casserole dish. Set aside.1 bag frozen tater tots
- In a large skillet, brown the ground beef until it's no longer pink. Then add the water, taco seasoning mix, and barbecue sauce. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until thickened. It will be very saucy and that is fine.2 pounds ground beef, 2 packets taco seasoning mix, 1.5 cups water, 1/2 cup barbecue sauce
- Spoon the ground beef mixture over the tater tots. Sprinkle with shredded cheddar cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Top with your favorite taco toppings and enjoy!1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, Taco toppings of your choice
Nutrition
If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.
~Maya Angelou
I would have a hard time living without indoor plumbing, hot water heaters, refrigerator/freezer, microwave, washing machine and dryer (only in the winter) and central heating! A/C I can live without but I don’t live in the south! I live on a farm so we have slaughtered pigs, chickens and steers, made our own sausage, smoked our meat, grow a garden and put up everything grown there. Love reading everyone’s answers to your great question!!
I am enjoying reading them all too Susan!! It’s fun seeing the different mindset of different people.
I never knew my grand dad but I remember my grandmother made aprons by hand stitching. She also made her bras all by hand. I have 2 quilts that she made totally by hand. I always wondered why she never had a sewing machine. On the other side of the family, I never knew my grandparents.
Oh wow, now I am curious. Maybe they couldn’t afford one?
She made them because she liked the fitand she had a hidden money pocket in it. She slept with it under her pillow at night when she visited.
I couldn’t live in a house without indoor plumbing….to be more specific – a bathroom! In my mind I can still picture the little trail you’d walk down to get to the outhouse. This is something my Mother’s parents did all the days they lived. They finally got electricity & a telephone when I was about 7 or 8 yrs. old in the mid to late 50s, but still didn’t get a bathroom put in. Not having these conveniences was how folks lived back then, especially when you lived way out in the country. My Grandparents married in 1909 and lived in the same house all through the years. Grandpa was a farmer and Grandma tended the house and kids. Never heard either of them utter a word of discontent either. Can you imagine the kids of today living without indoor water, electricity or a telephone??? Heaven forbid! 😉
Love & hugs,
Linda Copeland
Heaven forbid is right, and not just a telephone, a smartphone.
Mom could wring a chicken’s neck (“Nothing to it. Just grab it up by the neck and twirl it around overhead a couple of times”), clean it, and fry it. My chicken comes out burnt on the outside and raw on the inside.
She also could cook on a woodstove, and yearned to have one again. And lay a fire and use one match to get it going.
Her dad made moonshine!
Oh my goodness, I imagine you got to hear some interesting stories growing up!!!
My grandmothers also had to run households without electricity and cook on wood or coal ranges (they were both born in the 1800s). The cooking thing really impresses me because they both were proficient bakers and eleborate cooks. I can’t make lace cookies properly in an electric oven!
Loved reading everyones’ comments. Thank you for this topic which was heart rending and very enjoyable! May the Lord bless you and your family!
Blessings to you as well Barbara!!
My maternal grandparents lived on a farm with no electricity or running water. They raised seven children in the healthy fresh air of a clean and safe farm at the foot of the mountain. Their beautiful brownstone farmhouse has been sold and has been renovated and modernized now, but my grandparents did so many things for daily survival there that I hope I never have to do. However, they were happy, and it was their way of life!
It does seem that people were happier back then doesn’t it?
My grandparents had a “party line” telephone! Can you imagine that today???
I can remember when party lines were popular 😉
We had a party line at our new house in Detroit when we moved there in 1967, so that wasn’t that long ago (well, at least in MY mind!) Actually, that will be 50 years in Sept. Come to think of it, where HAS the time gone? LOL