Easy Chickpea Tacos Recipe
These Vegan Chickpea Tacos are the easy, delicious, weeknight meal you’ve been waiting for! They are seasoned with classic taco flavors – minus the mysterious ingredients hiding in pre-packaged blends. Cilantro Lime Slaw adds the perfect punch of bright, fresh flavor to create a vegetarian taco that your family will love.
You’ll Love This
- They’re so quick! These chickpea tacos are a simple, meatless meal that’s on the table in about 20 minutes and the hands-on cook time is very minimal! This means while the chickpeas are sautéing you can throw together my 5 Minute Cilantro Lime Slaw. This will add an amazing freshness, and you’ll have a flavorful, veggie-filled dinner ready in no time!
- It’s so simple! These easy vegan tacos practically cook themselves. The only skills required are chopping and stirring, so this is a great recipe for newer home cooks! Delicious dinners don’t need to have tons of ingredients or be difficult to make. Sometimes the simplest of meals end up being the most delicious!
- Cleanup is a snap! Dinner cleanup doesn’t get easier than wiping out one pan. With cooking oil and regular stirring, there probably won’t even be anything stuck to your pan when it’s time to clean up! One-pan dinners are my personal favorite and this one is no exception!
Instructions
Dry chickpeas thoroughly on a clean kitchen towel. Heat oil in a large pan. Add chickpeas to the pan and cook, stirring frequently, for 10 minutes.
Add chili powder, cumin, oregano, garlic powder, along with a couple large pinches of salt and pepper and the remaining olive oil. Toss to coat the chickpeas evenly.
Then cook for another minute or two until the chickpeas are crispy but not burned.
Serve with flour tortillas, Cilantro Lime Slaw, vegan sour cream, and Cotija.
Tips
- Be sure to dry the chickpeas thoroughly before cooking. Any water left on the chickpeas will cause the hot oil to spit and splatter which is no good! Be sure to dry them as much as possible before adding them to the oil.
- You can remove the skin from the chickpeas if you want, but it’s not necessary. Removing the skin will allow the chickpeas to get a bit more crispy, but removing them is a LOT of work and very tedious. And they’ll taste the same either way!
- Spice it up! If you like your vegan chickpea tacos with a bit of kick, add a pinch of cayenne to the spice mixture to increase the heat.
- Store leftovers! If you have leftovers (or if you want to meal prep or make extra) roasted chickpeas will stay good in the fridge for about a week in an airtight container. Give them a quick sauté in oil before serving to bring back their original crispy texture and dinner is ready!
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Did you love this recipe?
Please leave a 5-star rating and review below!
Easy Chickpea Tacos Recipe
These Vegan Chickpea Tacos are the easy, delicious, weeknight meal you’ve been waiting for! They are seasoned with classic taco flavors – minus the mysterious ingredients hiding in pre-packaged blends. Cilantro Lime Slaw and homemade Pico de Gallo add the perfect punch of bright, fresh flavor to create a vegetarian taco that your family will love.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Total Time: 20 minutes
- Yield: 8 small tacos 1x
- Category: Main Dish
- Method: Stove Top
- Cuisine: Mexican/American
- Diet: Vegan
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons + 2 teaspoons olive oil, divided
- 2 (15 oz.) cans chickpeas, drained
- 1.5 teaspoon chili powder
- 1.5 teaspoon cumin
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- Kosher salt
- fresh cracked pepper
- 8 street taco flour tortillas
Serve with:
- Easy Cilantro Lime Slaw
- vegan sour cream
- vegan Cotija cheese
Instructions
- Dry chickpeas thoroughly on a clean kitchen towel. Be sure to remove as much water as possible so the oil doesn’t splatter when you add them to the pan.
- Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a large pan over medium heat.
- Add chickpeas to the pan and cook, stirring frequently for 10 minutes.
- Add chili powder, cumin, oregano, garlic powder, along with a couple pinches of salt and pepper and the remaining 2 teaspoons of olive oil.
- Toss to coat the chickpeas evenly.
- Then cook for another minute or two until the chickpeas are crispy.
- Serve with flour tortillas, Cilantro Lime Slaw, vegan sour cream, and Cotija.
Equipment
Notes
- Be sure to dry the chickpeas thoroughly before cooking. Any water left on the chickpeas will cause the hot oil to spit and splatter which is no good! Be sure to dry them as much as possible before adding them to the oil.
- You can remove the skin from the chickpeas if you want, but it’s not necessary. Removing the skin will allow the chickpeas to get a bit more crispy, but removing them is a LOT of work and very tedious. And they’ll taste the same either way!
- Spice it up! If you like your vegan chickpea tacos with a bit of kick, add a pinch of cayenne to the spice mixture to increase the heat.
- Store leftovers! If you have leftovers (or if you want to meal prep or make extra) roasted chickpeas will stay good in the fridge for about a week in an airtight container. Give them a quick sauté in oil before serving to bring back their original crispy texture and dinner is ready!
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 taco
- Calories: 202
- Sugar: 0.1 g
- Sodium: 498.4 mg
- Fat: 8.7 g
- Carbohydrates: 25.2 g
- Fiber: 5.2 g
- Protein: 7.4 g
- Cholesterol: 0 mg
Is cheese a vegan ingredient? Cotija is cheese didn’t it?
There are vegan versions of just about every kind of cheese, including Cotija cheese.
Hi, for the nutritional content, is that ~7g of protein per taco?
Yes! Per taco!
My apologies – I misread the recipe. Later on, you do indeed specify vegan cotija. Carry on – looks delicious, and I will try it.
So you have mentioned in several Mexican recipes about your easy pico de gallo recipe. Every time I click the link to find the recipe I get an error message. Could you please post or repost that recipe. Please and thank you!
Hi Diane! I removed many recipes from my site that could be interpreted as cultural appropriation and Pico de Gallo was one of them. I have gone through and removed those links now or updated them with a delicious homemade Pico de Gallo recipe from Isabel Eats. Here is the link: https://www.isabeleats.com/mexican-pico-de-gallo-recipe/
This looks great! I’ve tried to make chickpeas before and ended up with “crunchy” – like a corn nut – rather than crispy.
How would you descibe the texture of these when done correctly – so I know what I’m aiming for?
Love your site!!
I know exactly what you mean!! I’ve tried some oven-roasted chickpea recipes and they come out like little chickpea pellets! For these tacos, I aim for a crispy texture on the outside, while still keeping a tender texture on the inside. The key is to saute them in oil first before adding any spices so that the outside has a chance to crisp up, but it doesn’t dry the chickpea out in the middle. Great question! I hope you love this recipe as much as I did! 🙂