Healthy Taco Salad

For once this season a blizzard hitting the east coast missed us, but we’re still having wind storms like you wouldn’t believe. Yet again, I’ve turned to colorful, comforting food to cheer us up when the weather is cold and gray.

Taco Salad

For taco meat:
1 lb. lean ground beef or turkey
3 tsp. chili powder
2 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. garlic powder
2 small-medium onions or 1 large onion, chopped

For salad:
1 head romaine lettuce, washed and chopped
1 bell pepper, diced
1 can corn, drained
½ can kidney beans or black beans (I used garbanzo because that’s what I had)
4 green onions, diced
½ can black olives (whole, sliced, chopped, it doesn’t matter)
Salsa
Sour cream

Throw all the taco meat ingredients into a pan over medium high heat, breaking up the meat and incorporating the spices. Cook until browned.

Layer salad ingredients on your plates and top with a few spoonfuls of cooked taco mixture. Serves 4 generously.

This is a healthy and filling meal. If you’ve given up meat for Lent, you can still make this by leaving out the meat and adding more beans. Season the beans as you would the taco meat, but only using about half the amount of each spice.