Santa Monica Street Tacos
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Santa Monica Street Tacos – Flavorfully seasoned steak, cooked to perfection and then wrapped in a white corn tortilla!
Calling all taco lovers! Try these Slow Cooker Korean BBQ Pork Tacos, Instant Pot Shredded Chicken Tacos, and Baja Fish Tacos for your next taco Tuesday meal!
Have you had street tacos? Street tacos are the best, most authentic (in my opinion) tacos you can get anywhere. They’re sold on little street carts and they are my absolute favorite. I grew up getting them pretty often with my family and I’m telling you, I could put away three, four, five of those tacos on any given day. I crave them regularly. As in, all the time.
By some sad miracle my husband had never tried street tacos before we were married. Whaaaaaattttt????
Don’t worry, I remedied that. Last year when we took a cruise to the Caribbean we had the best street tacos. Okay, I probably say that about every new taco stand I get a taco from but, when you’re craving a good street taco, the next one you eat is always the best one. I made my husband try one and he loved it. Of course.
So there’s a reason I didn’t call these just “street tacos”. They’re Santa Monica Street Tacos, right? Well they were inspired by some tacos I had when visiting my brother in Santa Monica, California. After a big day of beach sitting and Hollywood street roaming, we had a hankering for some real good street tacos. The thing about So-Cal is, there’s a taco stand on just about every other street corner. Sometimes two. We found a stand that looked especially promising (okay we were desperate, it was the first one we came to), and bought ourselves four or five tacos (they’re so cheap!). They came with a lime-y cilantro-y sweet and tangy dressing that I’ve craved ever since. The steak was minced just so, and it was topped with fresh red cabbage and diced white onions.
You can make tacos a hundred million different ways but I really like these ones. They taste so…. fresh. I don’t know what it is about these but they are just so light and healthy and refreshingly tasty, I can’t get enough of them! The best part (can there be a best part??) is that they’re so dang easy. Seriously, done in less than thirty minutes and you don’t have to heat up your oven. Love it. Make these for game day, make these for date night, make them for Tuesday Taco Night, just make them.
More Recipes to Try
- Southwest Loaded Potato Skins – one bite and you’ll be reaching for “just one more.”
- Oven Baked Crab Avocado Wontons – irresistible finger food that disappears fast.
- Green Chile Queso Blanco – one dip and you’ll be hooked!
- Oven Baked Onion Rings – so good you’ll forget they’re not fried.
When you make this recipe, snap a photo and tag me on social – I love connecting with you and seeing what you’re up to in the kitchen!
Santa Monica Street Tacos
Ingredients
- 6 6-inch white corn tortillas , (you can sub yellow corn if you can’t find white corn)
- 1 pound skirt steak, trimmed of fat and sliced into thin strips
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 teaspoon oil
- 1 cup diced onion
- ½ cup cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
- 2 cups thinly sliced red cabbage
Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette
- ¾ cup cilantro leaves
- juice of 2 limes
- ⅓ cup oil
- 4 teaspoons minced garlic
- ¼ cup white vinegar
- 4 teaspoons sugar
- ¼ cup milk
- ½ cup sour cream
Instructions
- Heat oil over medium heat. Season sliced steak with salt, cayenne pepper, and garlic powder. Add steak to pan and sauté until cooked through (about 8-10 minutes). Add garlic and sauté 1-2 minutes longer until garlic is fragrant. Remove from heat and dice steak.
- Whisk together all ingredients for vinaigrette. Add mixture to a blender and pulse 1-2 minutes until smooth. Add 1/4-1/3 cup steak to each tortilla (hot tip: if you microwave them for 30-45 seconds they’ll be easier to handle and super delicious!) top steak with cabbage, onions, and chopped cilantro. Drizzle with vinaigrette and serve immediately.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
These were Awesome!
Nutritional info??
Hi Nicolette- I recommend to all my readers that you use My Fitness Pal- they have an awesome online took where you can input any URL into and it will generate the nutritional information for you!
Awesome thanks for the great recipes
Thank you for this recipe! I’ve used it several times and it’s always my go to for street tacos. Yum!
Made these for dinner tonight. Fantastic!
I used some red pepper flakes in the garlic sauté stage of the beef. Spiced it up a bit.
Great recipe and easy as pie. Yum!
The sauce was extremely sweet. I think it’s best to omit the sugar…
Silly question…but the Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette doesn’t have any cilantro listed in the ingredients – how much does it need?
So sorry for the confusion! I’ve updated the recipe to include the cilantro 😉
Thanks! You updated it just in time for me – this is on the menu for dinner tonight! 🙂
The vinaigrette is something that looks great for a lot of things. I had a question though. It says that it is a Cilantro Lime one but there is now cilantro in the recipe. I think I see some on the spoon the you are using to dress the tacos. Was this left off the recipe? Love the blog.
So sorry for the confusion! I’ve updated the recipe to include the cilantro 😉
Oh my goodness! These look incredible! I love street tacos so much. P.S. What lens do you use because your photos are unbelievable!
Hi Mandy! Thanks so much, street tacos are my favvvvv! I shoot with a Canon 7D with the 1.8 50mm lens, it’s SO inexpensive and I love it!!