Mexican Shredded Beef Machaca

This is a recipe for Mexican Shredded Beef for tacos or burritos. Beef Machaca is a Mexican Slow Simmered pulled beef from a Pot Roast. This tender Mexican shredded Beef Machaca is full flavored and can be used to make burritos, tacos, breakfast burritos and huevos.

Beef Machaca Huevos. Simply a warm flour tortilla topped with a helping of Beef Machaca and a fried egg.

I’ve only recently been introduced to Beef Machaca, thanks to Young Guns Chile out of New Mexico and one of their Facebook postings featuring Machaca.

Authentic Beef Machaca

Beef Machaca is that flavorful authentic shredded beef that you find in burritos and tacos. You know the ones…you can’t quite figure out why the meat is so good. The recipe originally comes from Sonora and used to make burritas, an everyday type of taco there.

Machaca in its traditional form is the Mexican equivalent of beef jerkey. Beef that has been marinated, cooked, shredded and dried. The drying process preserved the beef, made it easy to pack on the trail.

The Tex-Mex version is a braised beef dish that can be served alone with tortillas for tacos and burritos. And that’s just a beginning on how to use this tender Mexican meat.

Many people still call it Machaca, although it’s often referred to on menus simply as shredded beef. There are many subtle differences in how it is prepared from recipe to recipe. I didn’t find any two recipes exactly the same. Some were complicated with flavor, some added wine and some were quite simple, adding just onion, cumin and green chile and boiled in water stove-top.

The recipe I found over at Texas Cooking sounded perfect to me and made some of the best pulled beef tacos I’ve ever had..

With just the two of us in our house, this wonderful Mexican beef lasted a few days. We enjoyed breakfast burritos filled with Beef Machaca, fresh chopped tomatoes and scrambled eggs.

With some melted cheese on top and rings of fresh sliced sweet onion, a side of hash browns and oranges, it was a wonderful south of the border breakfast.

Beef Machaca alone is divine, so just a flour tortilla filled with the hot meat is an easy little street style snack.

And if you can believe it, I did make my own flour tortillas using this recipe. I was pretty pleased for my first try.

Machaca is a great example of cooking with one of my favorite techniques, braising. I look forward to making this again to use in chiles rellenos and enchiladas. It’s so easy to make I’m starting to wonder if I’ll ever use ground beef again for Mexican.  A Mexican version of tender pot roast, it’s simply simmered stove top with some spices…let the fiesta begin!

Recipe for Mexican Shredded Beef Machaca

I hope you give this Mexican beef taco recipe a try. And if you do, please come back and let me know how you liked it and give the recipe a star rating.

Your feedback is valuable to me for developing future recipes. And if you have a favorite pulled beef taco recipe, let me know, I’d love to give it a try.

And if you’re looking for more South of The Border Mexican Roast Beef ideas, you won’t want to miss my recipe for Mexican Pot Roast. Just right spicy.

5 from 4 votes

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Beef Machaca

Prep Time

30 mins

Cook Time

2 hrs 30 mins

Total Time

3 hrs

 

Pot roast is slow braised in Mexican spices and then shredded. Great for tacos, burritos and all things Mexican and Tex-Mex.

Course: Main Course Beef

Cuisine: Mexican

Servings: 12

Author: adapted from Texas Cooking

Ingredients

• For the marinade:
• ¼ cup Worcestershire sauce
• Juice of two limes
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon New Mexico chili powder or Ancho Chile Powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon black pepper
• ½ cup vegetable oil or olive oil
• To cook the beef:
• 2-3 pounds Chuck Roast or Skirt Steak trimmed and cut into portions.
• 1 large sweet onion diced
• ½ green bell pepper diced
• 4 cloves of garlic minced or pressed
• 1 jalapeno pepper minced
• 1-14 ounce can diced tomatoes or tomatoes with green chilies
• ¼ cup beef broth
• 1 tablespoon dried Mexican oregano
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon hot pepper sauce such as Tabasco
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1/2 teaspoon cider vinegar
• Vegetable oil for searing the beef

Instructions

1. For the marinade, combine all the ingredients in a bowl then whisk them to form an emulsion. Add the beef making sure every piece is evenly coated. Cover and refrigerate.
2. Marinate the beef overnight in a bowl in the refrigerator. Before preparing, drain thoroughly and allow meat to come up to room temperature for about 30 minutes.
3. In a Dutch oven, heat a few tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat until very hot. Sear the beef a few pieces at a time to develop a rich brown color on all sides as well as on the bottom of the pan. Do this in several batches if the pot is too crowded.
4. When all the beef is browned nicely and removed from the pan, add the onions, peppers, and garlic to the hot pan. Saute for a few minutes then add the remaining ingredients to the pan along with the beef. Bring to a boil, scraping the browned bits off the bottom of the pan. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer slowly for about 2 hours. The meat should be very tender and should easily fall apart when pricked with a fork.
5. Remove from heat, remove meat to a cutting board and shred with a pair of forks. Return to the pot and bring to a simmer, uncovered. Reduce the liquid until very thick, almost dry. At this point, adjust the seasoning with salt, pepper, and whatever additional heat you want to add if any.

6. Finish by stirring in the vinegar. 

Recipe Notes

When adding the canned tomatoes with peppers, I like to add plain canned tomatoes and chop 3 Hatch chile peppers that have been roasted and seeded.

Can’t get enough taco recipes?  How about crisping up your next Taco Night. Take a look at this fried version:

Fried Beef Tacos