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Transform your taco game with these tasty oven-baked Buffalo chicken tacos

Grateful

Say adios to boring shredded-chicken tacos and say ¡hola! to these tastier Buffalo chicken tacos, based on a recipe inspired by Gal on a Mission. They’re baked in the oven — yes, baked — and the result is a spicy chicken filling nestled in a crispy taco shell smothered in bubbly cheese.

Bake and shred your seasoned chicken, then kick it up a notch with some cream cheese, butter and hot sauce to transform it into a give-me-more Buffalo-style filling. Then, it’s time to make tacos like you’ve never made them before: in the oven.

Certainly, you can scoop your Buffalo chicken into taco shells and serve them right away, but baking them in the oven gives the hard taco shells time to heat up, absorb the chicken flavor, and get deliciously blanketed with melted cheese.

When it’s all ready, bring your baking dish to the table and serve immediately with lettuce, tomatoes, sour cream and hot sauce.

This is one fast, easy dinner for a family or a hungry crowd. All you have to do is assemble the tacos, and the oven finishes them off to tasty perfection.

Oven baked Buffalo chicken tacos

Yield: 12 tacos

Ingredients

Buffalo chicken mixture:

  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon paprika
  • 2 large chicken breasts
  • 4 ounces cream cheese, softened at room temperature
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1/4 to 1/2 cup Frank's Red Hot Sauce (or your favorite variety), to taste

Tacos:

  • 12 hard taco shells
  • Buffalo chicken mixture
  • 1 cup Mexican four-cheese shredded cheese
  • 1-1/2 cups lettuce, shredded (optional)
  • 2 medium tomatoes, chopped (optional)
  • 1/2 cup sour cream (optional)
  • Hot sauce, to taste (optional)

Instructions

Buffalo chicken mixture:

  1. Preheat oven to 450F.
  2. Mix salt, pepper and paprika in small ramekin. Coat each chicken breast lightly with spice mix.
  3. Grease an 8- by 8-inch baking dish or sheet.
  4. Place chicken into baking dish and bake for 18 minutes.
  5. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for additional 5 minutes.
  6. Allow chicken breasts to cool completely. Shred using two forks.
  7. Place cream cheese, butter and hot sauce into large skillet and simmer over medium heat until cream cheese has melted, stirring frequently.
  8. Add shredded chicken to mixture and stir to coat. Remove from heat.

Tacos:

  1. Preheat oven to 400F. Arrange hard taco shells in 8- by 8-inch baking dish.
  2. Place 1 to 2 tablespoons of Buffalo chicken mixture into each hard shell. Top with shredded cheese. Repeat with all tacos.
  3. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until cheese has melted.
  4. Serve with lettuce, tomatoes, sour cream and hot sauce, if desired.

Check out these recipes to up your kitchen game: 

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