Slow Cooker Beef Barbacoa Tacos

The one-year mark of this blog was a few weeks ago and I have been thinking about what I want to write about going forward. The truck cooking tips are popular. The budget meals are popular. The Nebraska life stuff, the stories about the kids and Dave and Gayle, those are what people comment on most. People do not just want recipes. They want the kitchen. They want the mess and the noise and the kid who will not eat the casserole and the husband who cannot cook and the mother who shows up with meatloaf uninvited. They want life. I can do life. I have been doing life for thirty-nine years and I have gotten reasonably good at it.

I made a new recipe this week that I am already planning to post about: slow cooker beef barbacoa. I was inspired by a taco truck I saw at a truck stop in Kansas City last week. I did not eat there, because I had my own food, but I thought: I could make that in my slow cooker. So I did. Chuck roast, chipotle peppers in adobo, lime juice, cumin, oregano, garlic, onion, chicken broth. Eight hours on low. The result was shredded beef that was smoky and tender and slightly spicy and perfect in tortillas with cilantro and onion and a squeeze of lime.

I made it in the truck and ate it at a rest stop outside Kearney, and the trucker next to me asked what smelled so good, and I gave him a taco, and he ate it standing in the parking lot with the wind blowing and said that is the best taco he has ever had. I said it was made in a slow cooker in a Peterbilt. He said he did not care where it was made. He cared that it existed. That is the spirit of truck cooking: it does not matter where. It matters that.

At home, I remade the barbacoa for the family. The kids were mixed: Tyler loved it, Amber loved it, Justin ate it without complaint, and Josie picked out the meat and ate it plain because she does not trust tortillas this month. Josie food preferences change with the moon and I have stopped tracking them. She eats. She grows. The details are her business.

Gayle tried it on Sunday and said it was interesting, which from Gayle means she liked it but it is not meatloaf and therefore not entirely trustworthy. That is fair. Some people are meatloaf people. Gayle is a meatloaf person. I am an everything person. We are both right.

The barbacoa earned its place at our table the moment a stranger ate it in a parking lot and meant every word he said—that is the kind of recipe you write down and keep. It did not need a kitchen to prove itself, and it does not need much from you at home either: just a slow cooker, a chuck roast, and enough time to let the chipotle and garlic do their work. Here’s exactly how I make it.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 8 hours | Total Time: 8 hours 15 min | Servings: 8

Ingredients

3 to 4 lbs chuck roast
3 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, roughly chopped (plus 2 tablespoons of the adobo sauce)
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium yellow onion, roughly chopped
1/2 cup chicken broth
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice (about 2 limes)
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
For serving: corn or flour tortillas, diced white onion, fresh cilantro, lime wedges

Instructions

Season the beef. Pat the chuck roast dry with paper towels. Season all over with salt and pepper. If you have a few minutes and a pan available, sear it in a little oil over high heat, 2 to 3 minutes per side, for deeper flavor. Skip this step if you’re cooking on the road — it still turns out great.
Build the slow cooker base. Place the chopped onion and garlic in the bottom of the slow cooker. Lay the beef on top.
Add the flavor. Scatter the chipotle peppers over the beef and pour the adobo sauce over everything. Add the chicken broth and lime juice, then sprinkle the cumin and oregano over the top.
Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours, or HIGH for 4 to 5 hours, until the beef shreds easily with two forks.
Shred and rest. Remove the beef to a cutting board and shred with two forks, discarding any large pieces of fat. Return the shredded meat to the slow cooker and stir it into the juices. Let it sit for 10 minutes to soak up the liquid.
Serve. Pile the barbacoa into warm tortillas. Top with diced white onion, fresh cilantro, and a good squeeze of lime. Eat immediately, ideally with wind blowing and no particular place to be.

Nutrition (per serving)

Slow Cooker Beef Barbacoa Tacos — The Taco a Trucker Called the Best He’d Ever Had