Farrah's Hickory BBQ Taco Kit product reviews

I enjoy a good taco kit for those days where I want a meal that tastes good and doesn't really require any heavy thinking, I can just follow the instructions and cook away. Hickory BBQ is a flavour that I enjoy but don't find much that I like as I can be a tad fussy, so I looked forward to giving this a try. I ended up making this on a night where no one was hugely hungry, which meant that it shared well between the five of us. This recipe calls for beef strips but I made this a vegetarian based meal and cut some nutmeat into strips and cooked it up in the Hickory BBQ spice mix. The kids liked the aroma but were a bit dubious due to the various spices added to the dish.

I had thinly sliced onion, carrots and cabbage, which we place on top of the tortillas, before putting some of the mayo on top. One kid happily ate theirs with minimal complaint, but the other two desired some sour cream be added to their meal to help counter the heat from the various spices. My mother and I enjoyed ours and felt that the mix worked really well with the nutmeat and I really enjoyed the mayo that came with this. I found this to be a nice and easy dish which I would happily eat again, even if the kids won't, I can adjust theirs by cooking some nutmeat without the spice mix and then they'd be quite happy to eat this. Not sure if this means we will buy this again, but I enjoyed it.

We have been big fans of Farrah's Crispy Chicken Taco kits so I was excited to try their Hickory BBQ Beef Tacos kit. The kit contains 10 flour tortillas, hickory spice mix, and some BBQ mayo. As were are trying to reduce our red meat consumption, I used chicken with this kit and I think I have just found a new family favourite!

The kit says the meal will be ready in 20 minutes and you can probably do it slightly quicker, which means it's a great weekday meal when you need something quick and easy to prepare. I cut two chicken breasts into small pieces and tossed them in the spice mix. I then cooked them in our air fryer and they were cooked a lovely golden colour in 15 minutes.

The tortillas were quickly cooked in the microwave for 15 seconds which meant they came out warm and fluffy. We added rice, cheese, lettuce, and for the final pièce de rà ©sistance, the BBQ mayo. It was delicious and my youngest said it reminded her slightly of Big Mac sauce. The combination of the hickory spice on the chicken and the BBQ mayo was, for me, a match made in heaven! The chicken had a mild but delicious smoky bacon flavour and hubby even commented on this, saying how nice it was. Before we had finished, both kids were asking if we could have it again, and we most definitely will be!

Because there were just two of us (for once!) to test out this product, we opted to divide the spice mix and mayo packet and make two different meals. Hickory is one of those flavours that remind us of long evenings round the barbecue at my cousin's house in Whangamata - we may not have real hickory wood available for the fire, but there are always several bottles and jars brought back from their trips to the Americas. It is a rich, warm flavour which is totally amazing with shellfish and the occasional kahawai from one of their days out fishing.

We had neither shellfish nor kahawai, however, so made do with what we had in the freezer. Our first meal was based on beef, mushrooms, and dry roast peanuts. We had two smallish steaks available; these were cut into chunks, mixed with the spice, then fried with the mushrooms. It was a simple matter to assemble our tacos with the peanuts, salad, and a generous helping of the mayo. Although the meat and nuts were quite dry, the mayo made them juicy and added just a slight extra flavour boost - it was a very mild BBQ so it did not alter the hickory effect at all. As we had expected, these tacos were utterly delicious and we had no problem at all finishing two each. I think I could have eaten three at a pinch, but we wanted to save the rest for our next meal.

Our other meal could not have been more different! We had prepared some spare ribs - marinating them in the remainder of the spice mix and the rest of the mayo overnight. I am not sure whether or not mayo should be used in this way, but it worked for us. The ribs absorbed most of the moisture and by the time we came to cook them they looked and smelled delicious. We cooked them in a slow oven inside a covered dish, checking them regularly to make sure they did not dry out.

While the ribs were cooking, we spread the remaining six tortillas with a little melted butter and minced garlic, folded each one, then cut them into wedges and wrapped them in foil. A few minutes before taking the ribs out to serve, we put the plate of tortillas into the oven with them so they could warm through. We were planning to eat outside because ribs are notorious for being messy, so it was strictly fingers only. With a side dish of small corn cobs, our dinner was complete: hickory ribs with soft garlic tortilla wedges to mop up the juices. It was a raging success and for once I was glad we had no family or friends drop in as we got to eat it all!

We are big burrito fans in our household and will generally make the menu at least twice a month so were more than willing to try this product out. I opted for sirloin steak which happened to be on special but worked out to be so tender and tasty. This was super easy to prepare and the whole meal took less than 5 minutes to prep and cook. I accompanied the steak with red onion which I also fried with at the end with the steak as I don't like raw onion and had some left over shredded carrot and beetroot slaw.

The hickory BBQ seasoning was the perfect flavour mix and tasted delicious and reminded me of restaurant quality BBQ ribs. I thought that the BBQ mayo on its own was a little bland but when it was accompanied with the whole made up taco it worked brilliantly. A good match of flavour from the meat with the creaminess of the mayo.

I got the thumbs up from husband and would definitely make a re-appearance in the regular Champion weekly menu. Other suggestions on the packet would be to use pulled pork which I think would also work very well so perhaps next time would give that a go in the slow cooker.