Taco night usually means standing over a skillet pushing meat around while everybody asks how much longer. This is the version where the oven does the work. Chicken, peppers and onions go onto one sheet pan, twenty minutes at a high heat, and what comes out has charred edges you cannot get in a crowded skillet.
The seasoning goes on before the oil, straight onto the dry chicken, so it grips the meat instead of sliding off into the parchment. That is the whole trick, and it is why this does not need a foil packet with a list of ingredients you would rather not read.
October is the right month for it. Bell peppers are at the very end of their Carolina run, with a few weeks left to buy them from somebody local before the first hard frost, and the onions came out of the fall harvest and will keep in a dark cupboard all winter. If you would rather cook what is coming out of the ground this week, there is a North Carolina sweet potato swap and a fall cabbage slaw waiting in the Chef's notes.
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Sheet Pan Chicken Tacos with Rock Yo' Taco
Chicken, peppers and onions tossed with organic Rock Yo' Taco and roasted on one sheet pan at a high heat, then piled into warm tortillas with lime and cilantro.
Ingredients
For the pan
- 1 1/2 lb boneless, skinless chicken thighs, sliced into 1/2-inch strips
- 2 Tbsp plus 1/2 tsp Rock Yo' Taco organic seasoning, divided
- 2 Tbsp olive oil or avocado oil, divided
- 2 bell peppers, any colour, sliced 1/2 inch thick
- 1 large red onion, halved and sliced 1/2 inch thick
- 3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- Juice of 1 lime
To finish
- A small handful of chopped fresh cilantro
- 1 cup shredded Monterey Jack or a Mexican blend, optional
- Flaky sea salt, to taste at the table
On the table
- 8 to 12 small corn or flour tortillas, warmed
- Sour cream, diced avocado, pickled jalapeños, lime wedges
- Shredded fall cabbage tossed with lime, if you want some crunch
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 425°F with a rack in the upper third, and line a large rimmed sheet pan with parchment. The upper third is not fussiness: up near the top element the edges blister and char, and lower down the same pan only cooks things through.
- Pat the chicken strips properly dry with paper towel and spread them on a plate. Scatter 1 1/2 tablespoons of the Rock Yo' Taco over them and toss with your hands until every strip is coated. Leave it while you cut the vegetables. Ten minutes is enough for the salt in the blend to start working into the surface of the meat.
- Slice the peppers and the onion a good half inch thick. Thinner than that and they collapse in a hot oven before the chicken is done.
- Tip the peppers, the onion and the garlic into a bowl, add 1 tablespoon of the oil and the remaining 1/2 tablespoon plus 1/2 teaspoon of Rock Yo' Taco, and toss until everything is evenly coated.
- Drizzle the last tablespoon of oil over the seasoned chicken and toss again. The seasoning went on dry and the oil goes on after, which is the one thing that keeps the blend on the meat instead of sliding off onto the parchment.
- Spread everything on the pan in a single layer, chicken down the middle and vegetables around the outside. Give the pieces room. A crowded pan steams, and steamed chicken is the reason most sheet pan dinners taste flat.
- Roast 12 minutes without touching it. Then toss everything with a spatula and roast 8 minutes more, until the chicken reaches 165°F and the edges of the peppers have gone dark and blistered.
- If you want more char than that, run the pan under the broiler for 60 to 90 seconds at the end. Stand there and watch it, because it goes from charred to burnt in about fifteen seconds.
- Squeeze the lime over the hot pan and scatter the cilantro. If you want cheese, put it on now while the pan is still hot enough to melt it.
- Warm the tortillas in a dry skillet for about 15 seconds a side, then bring the pan to the table and let everybody build their own.
The seasoning goes on dry, before the oil
Two tablespoons and a half teaspoon in total, divided: a tablespoon and a half on the chicken, the rest on the vegetables. On the chicken it goes on the dry meat first and the oil follows, which is backwards from how most people do it and is the reason it works. Oil first and the blend slides off into the parchment, where it burns. Dry first and it grips, then the oil carries the heat into it.
Give it room, and put it up high
A half sheet pan holds a pound and a half of chicken and two peppers in one layer and not an ounce more. If it is piled up, use two pans and put both in the upper half of the oven. And a rack in the upper third is worth the thirty seconds it takes to move: the difference between charred edges and pale, damp vegetables is almost entirely how close they sat to the top element.
What is actually in season right now
Bell peppers are at the very tail end of their Carolina run. Field peppers keep coming until the first hard frost, so these are the last few weeks to buy them from somebody local rather than off a truck, and they are cheap right now because everybody is picking at once. Onions and garlic came out of the fall harvest and will keep in a dark cupboard all winter. Cilantro sulks through a Carolina summer and comes back on after the cool nights, so it is good again now.
The tortillas and the lime are bought and we are not going to pretend otherwise. If you want something that came out of the ground this week, a cup of small-diced North Carolina sweet potato added to the vegetables is the best answer, with that harvest at its peak this month, and it goes beautifully with the ancho and cocoa in the blend. Give it the full twenty minutes. A sharp slaw of shredded fall cabbage and lime piled into the tacos is the other one, and two handfuls of chopped collards thrown on for the last five minutes will crisp at the edges like kale chips.
Thighs, not breasts, and here is why
Boneless thighs stay juicy at 425F even if you lose track of the clock, and they take a char without drying out. Breasts work and plenty of people prefer them, but slice them a little thicker, start checking at 14 minutes, and pull them the moment they hit 165F. There is no margin there at all.
Feeding a crowd
This doubles without changing a thing except the number of pans. Two half sheets on two racks, swap them top to bottom when you toss at twelve minutes, and everything finishes together. It is a generous way to feed people: the pans go down in the middle of the table, the tortillas go round, and nobody has to plate anything. For a bigger spread, put a second pan of Crispy Smashed Potatoes in at the same heat.
The day after
It keeps four days in the refrigerator. Warm it in a dry skillet rather than the microwave so the edges crisp again instead of going soft. Cold, it is the best quesadilla filling in the house, it makes a very good taco salad over shredded cabbage, and chopped fine with an egg on top it is a breakfast worth getting up for.
Make it yours, and mind the heat
The blend is deliberately mild, which is the right call when you are feeding people between eight and eighty. If your table wants more, a chopped chipotle in adobo tossed with the vegetables does it without fighting the cocoa in the blend. Shrimp works in place of chicken at eight minutes rather than twenty. And leaving the meat out altogether, doubling the peppers and adding a drained can of black beans for the last five minutes makes a genuinely good meatless pan.
One seasoning doing all of it
Rock Yo' Taco is our USDA Certified Organic taco blend — eleven ingredients, starting with sea salt, then organic onion, paprika, garlic, New Mexico chile, cumin, ancho, cocoa powder, oregano, coriander and red pepper. The cocoa is the one that surprises people. Nobody tastes chocolate; it just rounds the finish, and it is why twenty minutes in a hot oven tastes like more work than it was. No MSG, no fillers, no anti-caking agents, small batch, made by our family. And you control the salt, not a foil packet.
The seasoning itself is gluten free and kosher, and so are the chicken and the vegetables. The dish is only gluten free if what you serve it with is — corn tortillas are, flour tortillas are not, and it is worth a look at the label on whatever sour cream or pickled jalapeños go on the table. We make it in the 5 oz resealable pouch, which stores flat in the cupboard and is easy to pinch from one-handed with a hot pan going.
More to put beside it
If this is your sort of weeknight, One-Pot Chicken Burrito Bowls is the same blend doing the same job on the stovetop with rice in the pan, and Chicken Enchilada Casserole is the make-ahead version for a night you want the oven to hold dinner for you. Rock Yo' Taco Chicken Tortilla Soup is what to make with the rest of the pouch when it turns cold. For the table itself, Rock Yo Taco Nachos and Rock Yo' Taco Queso feed a crowd standing up, Mexican Rice is the side if you have a second burner free, and Spooky Stuffed Peppers is the same seasoning in a costume when the end of October comes round.