My dad's parents passed on when I was about 8, so I never really got to know them too well. I always feel more connected to them when my dad cooks, because he'll often make something they used to make and we'll hear the story behind it. Pretty much my whole life growing up, Friday would be Taco Night, and Dad would make tacos the way Grandma did...not really a "recipe" but just a cooking technique.

You need ground beef, corn tortillas, vegetable oil, and whatever you like to put on tacos. (We always set the table with shredded lettuce, chopped tomato, chopped onion, and sour cream, but we found they were also good with half a slice of American cheese and some ketchup, weird as that sounds!)

Spread half of each tortilla with a very thin layer of beef, but leave the tortillas open-face. Then heat vegetable oil in a cast-iron skillet till it starts to sizzle -- pour in about a half-inch to start with. (You may need to add more as you cook; it has to completely cover each taco.) Once the oil is popping and sizzling, add one beef-spread tortilla and push it under the oil with a spatula. Once it gets soft -- only after a few seconds -- fold it over with the spatula so it looks like a taco. Fry it until the tortilla starts to turn crispy and the beef is browned all the way through. Because it's spread thinly, this will only take a minute or two. Carefully remove from the oil with a spatula and drain on paper towels to remove excess oil. Once you get the technique down you can do a couple at a time, whatever will fit in your skillet.

This is not the healthiest recipe, of course, because of all the oil, but very tasty for a once-in-a-while treat! As we got more health-conscious over the years we would make half our tacos like this, and make the other half skinless chicken chunks and refried beans wrapped in fat-free flour tortillas, to kind of balance things out. :-)