Baked Taco Bowls

Yesterday we decided to go out for some things we needed.  We knew it was going to snow and get very cold again later in the weekend.  It was a pretty nice winter day.  The first place we went was Menards.  For those who aren't familiar with this store, it is based in Central Wisconsin and throughout the years has grown into many many stores throughout Wisconsin and at least 14 other states.  I think they built their first home improvement store in the early 1970's and have been very successful.  They always have a gimmick to bring people in.  This weekend it was 14% off everything you can fit in a paper grocery bag.  We had fun filling it with stuff.  We bought mouse traps.  Yes even though I'm a wild animal lover, I do not like mice and don't feel bad when we kill them.  We bought suet cakes for the birds,  and we even bought 3 slabs of barbeque ribs.

The purchase that I wasn't so sure about was the Baked Taco Maker.  My husband thought this was a necessary gadget.  It was $3.99 minus the 14% equaling $3.43.   He likes taco salads but the calories in a fried taco shell bowl is almost 400 calories.  He thought that baking the shell would save a lot of calories.  So today for lunch we tried baking a flour tortilla and a low carb tortilla.

We baked them according to the directions in the package.  They said to bake them at 375 degrees for 10 minutes.  We liked how they looked when they came out of the oven.

They turned out great and looked very good.

The salad looked even better.

As we all know, looks can be deceiving.  They tasted like baked cardboard.  I guess all the that fat is what makes those taco bowls so tasty.  I wasn't going to give up.  Next I sprayed both sides of a tortilla with Olive Oil spray.  I figured that wouldn't add very many calories, and it might make it taste better.  I also baked them a little longer.  It did make it slightly better.  In fact, I broke it into pieces and it tasted good with salsa.   I still prefer a tortilla in a wrap.  I think I will have to find another use for those cute pans.  At least we didn't pay a fortune for them, and it gave me a topic to blog about.  There is always a silver lining.