One Pot Taco Spaghetti
All your favorite flavors of tacos in spaghetti form – made in ONE PAN! So cheesy, comforting and stinking easy with no clean-up!
Tacos in pasta form? Um, yes, please. I mean, the answer is always yes, right?
And if not, the answer should always be yes when it’s made in one single pan.
No joke here – everything gets dumped right in, including the uncooked spaghetti. And no, the tomatoes should not be drained. The liquid is crucial to help cook the pasta.
When ready to serve, sprinkle on that cheese to let it get all ooey gooey on top.
It’s practically a spaghetti casserole with pretty much zero work and clean-up!
One Pot Taco Spaghetti
All your favorite flavors of tacos in spaghetti form - made in ONE PAN! So cheesy, comforting and stinking easy with no clean-up!
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 pound ground beef*
- 1 1.25-ounce package taco seasoning
- 1 10-ounce can Ro*Tel® Mild Diced Tomatoes & Green Chilies
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 8 ounces spaghetti
- ½ cup shredded cheddar cheese
- ½ cup shredded mozzarella cheese
- 1 Roma tomato, diced
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro leaves
Instructions
- Heat olive oil in a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium high heat. Add ground beef and cook until beef has browned, about 3-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the beef as it cooks; stir in taco seasoning. Drain excess fat.
- Stir in Ro*Tel®, tomato paste, spaghetti and 3 cups water. Bring to a boil; cover, reduce heat and simmer until pasta is cooked through, about 13-16 minutes.
- Remove from heat and top with cheeses. Cover until melted, about 2 minutes.
- Serve immediately, garnished with tomato and cilantro, if desired.
Notes
*Ground chicken or pork can be substituted.
Did you make this recipe?
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Made this last night. All I can say is WOW! That combination of ingredients was so delicious. I usually tweek recipes to suit my tastes, but this recipe needed no tweeking. I can’t wait to make it for company. I will double the recipe.
Thank you for posting such easy to make and delicous recipes.
Great recipe. We all liked it and boy was it easy. Thanks!
This has turned into a favorite. We can’t eat any this to spicy and don’t care for rotel so used a can of diced tomatoes with onions instead. Turned out great. Not sure why some people are having trouble cooking pasta I didn’t have any trouble. Only trouble with recipe I had was hubby ate just about all of it. I had just a small amout from now on will have to make twice as much.
Made this tonight. It is so good and easy. I love your recipes.
Wow! Looking so tasty! Absolutely great cooking, I appreciated.
I dont know if anybody else had this problem but mine was SUPER watery. Looked way more like a soup than anything. I double checked the instructions and the measurements so I have no idea where I went wrong.
I had the same problem. I ended up draining off most of the water with a glass. If I make this again I will probably cook the pasta separately and mix it in at the end, which would be a shame.
Yes, I followed the directions exactly as written and ended up scooping out almost 2 cups of liquid at the end! If anyone has any insight on how to prevent this, I’d love to know because I love everything else about this recipe!
Was the pasta fully cooked through?
I’ve made this twice now. The first time I was also scooping water. The key is in that in the “bring to boil” step you really need to boil it. Not a light bubbling boil but a full rock-the-pot like you’re cooking dry pasta boil and let it go for a few minutes. The noodles absorb a lot of water at this stage.
I found this recipe on pinterest and tried it tonight. I too had a lot of water in the pot! I’m wondering if adding 10 oz. of pasta instead of 8 would take care of the problem? I also added chopped onion, yellow pepper, cumin, garlic powder, and dried cilantro in with the meat.
It was delicious; just too watery.
Similar to Laurie, I didn’t have a can of rotel, so I used a can of diced tomatoes and a can of diced green chilies. It was quite good. I loved the flavors. Next time, I will need to double the recipe. We tan out of taco spaghetti before we ran out of appetite.
I made this tonight, didn’t have rotel or a tomato, so I used a can of diced tomatoes and some salsa. I know it’s not exactly the same, but it worked and we enjoyed it. I roasted some yellow and green bell peppers and served them on the side.
Winner Winner Taco Dinner at our house last night!
If I wanted to cook the spaghetti separately and just add it in to beef mixture at the end, do I still use 3 cups of water or would it be less?
No, the water would not be needed.
By cooking the pasta separately, it would change the taste of the dish. We loved how the pasta absorbed the taco flavoring. We do suggest that if you do not like hot spices, that you omit the green chilies and use mild taco seasoning. Yum…..
Thanks for your feedback Pamela!
I am a vegetarian & converted this recipe to be vegetarian. It was delicious & my family loved it. Thank you & keep more like this coming.
Hello does the pasta stay al dente cooked like this or more on mushy side? Thanks!
The pasta stays al dente, unless it is overcooked – then it will turn to mush!
Hi there
Love your recipes, going to make this one this week.
Have you thought about including metric measurements as well? would be really helpful for us Aussies 🙂
I have tried some of your other one pot dishes and liked them. I’m going to make this tonight using ground turkey instead.
Pasta anything is good in my book. But taco pasta?! What a fun idea!
Love pasta in any way! This taco spaghetti dish is a really great idea, love the look of this dish. A really warming and hearty meal for January!
Is the cilantro nessisary? Any substitutions?
Not at all – parsley would be a great substitute.
Really late I know, but chopped green onion/chives would be good if you like either one of those.
Made this tonight and loved it. Added extra spoon of tomato paste to thicken a bit but I’ll definitely be making this again. That melted cheese hit the spot!
If I wanted to do 16 ozs of pasta, do I double everything else also? I would keep to 1 lb of meat. Thanks!
Yes, you would have to double all ingredients as needed.
That’s what I am doing for my family of 3 (me, mom, and dad) and it seems to be working fine so far. It’s not done yet though! The only thing I’m concerned about is the doubling water. There’s quiet a bit in it! I guess we’ll just have to see!
This recipe looks amazing! I’m about to make it with the 16oz of pasta how did the doubling of water go?
Wonder how this would work with zuk noodles? Cook for a lot less?
What a great idea! But unfortunately, without further recipe testing, I cannot answer with certainty. As always, please use your best judgment.