Right? You get the crunch from the hardshell but the structural integrity from the softshell, plus extra refried beans. These days, I more often make tacos from soft corn tortillas that I crisp up in a frying pan or air fryer first, but I’ll never turn my nose up at a combo shell.
I read the advice a long time ago: eat your hardshell taco messily over a soft tortilla. Add whatever you need at the end, if anything. Wrap it up, and BAM—another taco.
After some years of dealing with that frustration, I hit it from a separate angle-- order (or make) a salad with meat & bean combo (or “bowl”), then use toasted tortilla chips for your eating utensils.
In my family growing up we’d call something like this “haystacks”. Ostensibly one would put the stuff on top of a pile of the chips, but since it’d fall off or between them, it inevitably ended up being “use corn chips as scoops or tongs to grab the rest of the food with”.
That’s my problem with nachos, actually-- I don’t like soggy chips, so I keep them to the side.
Another little trick I like is to toast them in an air-fryer, first. It’s great for turning even slightly-stale snacks in to ‘just made’ crispy and crunchy-style.
These things are stressful to eat. They just disintegrate whenever I try to take a bite.
Put a soft-shell taco on the outside, adhered to the hardshell with a layer of refried beans.
That…is the most delicious taco I’ve ever had!
Right? You get the crunch from the hardshell but the structural integrity from the softshell, plus extra refried beans. These days, I more often make tacos from soft corn tortillas that I crisp up in a frying pan or air fryer first, but I’ll never turn my nose up at a combo shell.
I read the advice a long time ago: eat your hardshell taco messily over a soft tortilla. Add whatever you need at the end, if anything. Wrap it up, and BAM—another taco.
After some years of dealing with that frustration, I hit it from a separate angle-- order (or make) a salad with meat & bean combo (or “bowl”), then use toasted tortilla chips for your eating utensils.
Same. In-laws making hard shell tacos? It’s now all in a bowl with four half moon scooping devices.
These are great for that, btw!
https://www.google.com/search?q=fritos+scoop-shaped+chips&udm=2
In my family growing up we’d call something like this “haystacks”. Ostensibly one would put the stuff on top of a pile of the chips, but since it’d fall off or between them, it inevitably ended up being “use corn chips as scoops or tongs to grab the rest of the food with”.
That’s effectively how we do a taco salad at my house — chips at the bottom, then toppings over them.
That’s my problem with nachos, actually-- I don’t like soggy chips, so I keep them to the side.
Another little trick I like is to toast them in an air-fryer, first. It’s great for turning even slightly-stale snacks in to ‘just made’ crispy and crunchy-style.