A Doritos Taco Salad Board is a modern nod to the retro recipe that lets your dinner guests customize their own delicious taco salad.
Doritos Tao Salad is fondly remembered as the salad of my youth. This retro salad is typically made with taco-seasoned ground beef, lettuce, Nacho Cheese Doritos, and shredded cheddar cheese (amongst other tasty ingredients). You’d crush up the Nacho Cheese Doritos, combine everything in a bowl, then tie it all together with Catalina or French dressing.
The only drawback to Doritos Taco Salad was that leftovers didn’t fare so well, the chips and Romaine quickly becoming soggy. By serving a Doritos Taco Salad Board (a deconstructed Doritos Taco Salad of sorts) you can avoid this issue altogether. And because this is a choose your own adventure meal, you and your guests can customize the salad to suit your tastes. No Picky Polly cherry-picking out ingredients she doesn’t like and no Fad-Diet Fran declining to partake because you couldn’t remember they weren’t eating beans this week.
And most importantly, it’s impressive as AF. Just look at it.
Don’t have a charcuterie board just lying around? Jump on the board bandwagon and get yourself one!
How do you make a Doritos Taco Salad Board?
The key to putting together this beautiful board is all in the prep work. Since the only thing you need to cook is the ground beef, most of your time is concentrated on preparing the other ingredients. Put some effort into making nice, even dices of onion and pepper. Carefully mound ingredients into small serving bowls. Put dressings and sauces into pourable containers.
I chose to anchor the majority of toppings and sauces in opposing diagonal corners of the board for practical and aesthetic reasons. It looks pretty and if you have two people serving themselves at the same time, they can each focus on one side of the board without crossing streams (so to speak).
Then I filled in the remaining space with pre-cut and washed Romaine lettuce, which should make up at least half of your board since it is a salad after all :).
I opted for separate containers for the ground beef and Nacho Cheese Doritos. Mostly because I ran out of room, but you could certainly incorporate them into your Doritos Taco Salad Board.
To pre-crush your Doritos or not? I chose not to because I don’t want sad crushed up chip leftovers. But making your guests crush their own Doritos poses the challenge of cheesy hands. I say don’t forget to include napkins.
What ingredients do you need to make Doritos Taco Salad?
The beauty of the Doritos Tacos Salad is that you have culinary freedom. At a minimum you need:
- Nacho Cheese Doritos
- Taco-seasoned ground beef
- Lettuce
- Shredded cheese
- Catalina or French dressing
After you have the core ingredients, you can include whatever you’d like! I recommend the following:
- Pinto or black beans
- Cherry tomatoes
- Green bell pepper
- Yellow onion
- Black olives
- Pickled jalapenos
- Crema (as an optional sauce)
What other ingredients can you use for Doritos Taco Salad?
- Ground or shredded chicken
- Ground or shredded pork
- Shredded beef
- Sauteed portobello mushrooms
- Corn
- Red onions
- Banana peppers
Suggested Condiments:
Black Olive and Jalapeno Tapenade
Doritos Taco Salad Board
Equipment
- Charcuterie board
- 7 small condiment bowls
- 2 medium-sized serving bowls
- 2 small pourable jugs
- Tongs
Ingredients
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 2 1 ounce packages taco seasoning
- 3 heads Romaine lettuce chopped
- 1 15.5 ounce can pinto beans
- 1 9 3/4 ounce bag Nacho Cheese Doritos
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes
- 1 small yellow onion finely diced
- 1 green bell pepper finely diced
- 1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
- 1 cup pickled jalapenos
- 2 2.25 ounce cans sliced black olives
- Catalina or French dressing
- Crema
Instructions
- Cook 2 pounds of ground beef over medium heat, using a wooden spoon to break into small pieces as it cooks.
- Add 2 (1 ounce) packages of taco seasoning to the cooking ground beef. Stir to combine.
- Continue cooking until the beef is fully cooked, around 8 minutes.
- Remove the beef from heat. Once cooled, strain off any excess grease.
- Add the pinto beans, halved cherry tomatoes, diced onion, diced bell pepper, sliced black olives, and cheddar cheese to small individual bowls. Add crema and Catalina or French dressing to pourable jugs.
- Get creative! Arrange the bowls as you’d like on a charcuterie board. Then, fill in the remaining areas with chopped Romaine lettuce.
- Add the taco-seasoned ground beef to a medium-sized bowl to serve alongside the charcuterie board. Pour the Nacho Cheese Doritos into a bowl or onto a plate or leave ‘em in the bag!
- Serves 8-10 lucky ass people.
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