Instant Pot Birria Tacos with Consommé

These Instant Pot birria tacos with boneless short ribs and homemade birria tacos sauce makes the tenderest pulled beef recipe with a Mexican flare in 1 hour, then wrap in tortillas for dinner.

What is a Birria Taco?

A birria taco is a Mexican dish made with tender, slow-cooked meat—traditionally goat, but often beef or lamb braised in a rich, flavorful broth seasoned with chilies, spices, and herbs. The shredded meat is tucked into corn tortillas, often dipped in the braising consommé before being pan-fried until crispy. They’re typically served with a side of the consomme for dipping, making them both juicy and savory with every bite.

Ninja Foodi Birria Tacos

As with any of our other pressure cooker recipes it doesn’t matter what brand you have at home. We make it as an easy Ninja Foodi recipe of course, in our IP and a Crockpot Express would work just the same except you need to use the lid that is not attached.

Ingredient Notes

There are a few types of meat you could use for this. Lamb and beef are most common, but since we are focusing on family friendly we’re using boneless country style ribs. These work great for the wallet and break down well in order to suck up the flavors in that killer sauce while cooking.

Ok so you’ve made air fryer tacos filled with ground beef, great. Instant Pot pork tacos get super tender with flavorful drippings, yes. BUT then there’s these. You will NOT need to add anything to the top of these babies once they are done.

You literally just fill your air fryer taco shells or soft tortillas with maybe cilantro for flare and serve.

WITH a little bowl on your plate filled with the warm birria sauce from the pot. That is right, it’s kinda’ like a Mexican au jus if you want to call it that. If you left this part out it wouldn’t be birria, like French dip wouldn’t be right without that liquid on the side right??

Really you could use any cut of beef you wanted, I like using what I have in the freezer or what is on sale. Chuck roast works well too. The only suggestion is to use a boneless cut, or remove it yourself. Also I like a bit leaner so I don’t have to trim before or after serving. Less prep for me that way.

Peppers to Make Birria

Traditional birria is made of all different types of dried peppers like; cascabel chili peppers, Ancho chili peppers, New Mexico chili peppers and de arbol or guajillo chiles adobo. Then you add other seasonings like garlic, cumin, bay leaves, and onion, coriander, the list goes on and on.

If you have a Mexican grocery store nearby you can find them all there. I will link to them below too if it is easier to just order them all online.

This is easy with this one because it is going into a pot with liquid. First though you must prepare properly. Removing the stems and seeds is a MUST, that is the hot part. You might want to even use rubber gloves to do this if you think you might be sensitive.

How to Rehydrate Dried Peppers to Make Birria

Once seeds and stems are removed, discard those. Set your Instant Pot to saute and add them in. Move them around for about 5 minutes until they become fragrant. Add all of your other ingredients and liquids, heat under high pressure to rehydrate. When done, strain or blend until smooth in a blender and use the flavorful sauce to dip your tacos in

Easy peasy. If you want more of a medium heat then I suggest you cut the amount of each in half. Leaving them whole helps to tame them down as well so don’t slice or dice them into smaller pieces.

For a spicier sauce: Place all of the chiles and half of the liquid from the instant pot in a blender. Blend until smooth. For milder: Use a strainer to remove everything but the liquid. Make tacos out of the meat and serve sauce in a small bowl on the side.

How do you eat birria taco?

#1 DON’T THROW AWAY THAT SAUCE IN THE POT! Did I say that loud enough. 😉 That is what defines these from regular tacos. This is when you can really adjust to your liking. Of course if you blend the chiles themselves you will really ramp up the HOT. I usually strain everything out because I’m a wimp. 😉

You could add or offer other toppings if you are creating a quesabirria tacos bar for a party too though like;

Quesabirria Tacos

• Feta cheese
• Fresh chopped white onions and cilantro
• Diced fresh tomatoes
• To cool it down you could have blue cheese cole slaw available

Have soft corn tortillas or air fryer flour tortillas available or you can crisp them by adding the meat and cooking them in a cast iron skillet like you see here. Add cheese for birria quesadillas cooked until lightly crispy, or roll up inside and create a few air fryer flautas.

You could do the same thing in a slow cooker on low heat for 8 hours or until the meat can be shredded with 2 forks. On the stovetop in a large pot, covered, it would take several hours on medium high heat for the same tenderness. Let us know what you think after it’s served!!