Cauliflower + walnuts + chipotle = the most delicious vegan taco filling, in these Vegetarian Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos!
So this weekend I was looking at a fresh head of cauliflower and pondering what to make with it, when I ran across the fascinating idea of turning cauliflower + walnuts into vegan taco meat. Believe it or not, these Vegetarian Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos are completely vegetarian — or even vegan, if you don’t choose to top yours with cheese.
The taco “meat” itself is also low carb + gluten free, so MashupDad enjoyed a bunch of it on a big low carb wrap with cheese, salsa, avocado, and sour cream.
Isn’t this interesting? I clearly had to try it out for myself, so mashed up a couple of recipes from Brand New Vegan and Pinch of Yum and messed with the seasonings a bit in order to match our tastes over here. Behold: Chipotle. Cauliflower. Tacos!
I don’t usually post vegetarian recipes on Sunday, but let’s shake things up a bit and combine this Meatless Monday recipe with this week’s Sunday’s Scratchups: Your weekly recipe from scratch around grocery sales and affordable ingredients.
Vegetarian Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos
Ingredients
1 small head cauliflower florets (or 3/4 of a large one)
1 cup shelled walnuts (I used chopped)
4 oz fresh mushrooms, roughly chopped
Juice of one small lime
4 garlic cloves (or 2 tsp minced garlic)
1 Tbsp chili powder
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp smoked paprika
Sea salt, to taste
3 chipotles in adobo
1 Tbsp adobo sauce
Directions
Add cauliflower florets to your food processor and pulse until evenly ground into a taco-meat-like consistency, then remove cauliflower to a large bowl. (Be careful not to over-process or puree!)
Add all other ingredients to food processor, and pulse until they are a similar taco-meat-like consistency. Then, add the mushroom/walnut mixture to the bowl with your cauliflower and stir to combine.
Spread combined cauliflower mixture on a greased baking sheet and bake it at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.
Stir, and serve with your usual favorite taco fixings!
Note: If you have a tree nut allergy in your house, just leave out the walnuts and use a larger head of cauliflower: It might change the texture a bit, but the results should still be darn tasty.
Vegetarian chipotle cauliflower tacos are so interesting!
Chipotles in adobo truly are a wonder ingredient, and go a long way towards giving this Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos recipe its authentic taco flavor. Is a vegetarian tacos recipe going to fool the carnivore in your life? No, of course not — but that doesn’t mean he won’t like cauliflower tacos on their own merits! Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos have the look and flavor of taco meat, and offer a great whole foods, plant-based alternative for your Meatless Mondays.
So, here’s how these chipotle cauliflower tacos played out here: MashupDad said the flavor was right on but thought the walnuts made the texture slightly too crunchy, while I actually thought that the walnuts gave the flavor more oomph and prevented the tacos from being too mushy. Mr. 10 loved everything about these — and already has dibs on the leftovers tonight — while High School Guy wouldn’t even try it after learning that the recipe uses mushrooms.
Let me know what you think if you decide to give these cauliflower tacos a try, too, and browse more Meatless Monday recipes here.
Vegetarian Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos, printable recipe
Chipotle Cauliflower Tacos
Ingredients
- 1 small head cauliflower florets or 3/4 of a large one
- 1 cup shelled walnuts I used chopped
- 4 oz fresh mushrooms, roughly chopped
- Juice of one small lime
- 4 garlic cloves or 2 tsp minced garlic
- 1 Tbsp chili powder
- 1 tsp cumin
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- Sea salt, to taste
- 3 chipotles in adobo
- 1 Tbsp adobo sauce
Instructions
- Add cauliflower florets to your food processor and pulse until evenly ground into a taco-meat-like consistency, then remove cauliflower to a large bowl. (Be careful not to over-process or puree!)
- Add all other ingredients to food processor, and pulse until they are a similar taco-meat-like consistency.
- Then, add the mushroom/walnut mixture to the bowl with your cauliflower and stir to combine.
- Spread combined cauliflower mixture on a greased baking sheet and bake it at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.
- Stir, and serve with your usual favorite taco fixings!
Notes
Recipes in the real world
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