Flavorful, smoky grilled summer vegetables are absolutely delicious with black beans, cilantro and lime avocado cream, and crunchy toppings. These hearty tacos are filled with beautifully healthful ingredients to fill you up and make you feel great. 

Grilled vegetable tacos and black bean tacos topped with avocado cream sauce, cabbage, sliced radishes, and grilled pineapple makes a beautiful and healthy dinner.

We’ve just returned from our month in Italy. I’m so happy to be back to blogging. As much as I adore cooking and eating in Italy, I always come home craving Mexican food big time. Taco, burrito, or fajita night is at least a once a week meal for us, so we always miss it while away from California. I also come home craving loads of healthful, colorful veggies. This grilled veggie taco recipe is the result of those post-travel cravings.

A colorful spread of veggie tacos with black beans, avocado cream sauce, and pineapple.

This veggie taco recipe is highly adaptable, so feel free to play around with the veggies. I’m a big fan of  “clean out the fridge” meals, and that’s sort of the way this recipe went when I made it. After being away for a month, our veggie garden was bursting with zucchini, so that’s what I used the most of here. I also used a few pieces of cauliflower, though I’m not writing that into the recipe, because it’s what we had. Yellow summer squash, portobello mushrooms, corn, and bell peppers would also be delicious in this recipe and I can’t wait to try them next time I make this! At my daughter’s request, we added some pineapple to the grill. What a great idea! Sweet, juicy pineapple ads another irresistible layer of flavor.

The veggies get a quick brush with olive oil and sprinkle with taco seasoning. I love the rich smoky flavor the seasoning ads to the veggies. You can add as much or little taco seasoning as you would like. I went light since I wanted my kids to eat this, but feel free to go heavy for more flavor.

Beautiful veggie and black bean tacos with avocado cream sauce.

These veggie tacos are really easy to make. You can use an outdoor BBQ or a grill pan. If you don’t have either, you can cook the veggies in a skillet and they will still be delicious. The only trick is to not overcook the veggies. We want our grilled veggie filling to have some bite, and zucchini can easily go mushy when cooked a few minutes too long.

A colorful vegan burrito bowl with rice, black beans, grilled vegetables, and avocado cream sauce.

This is one of those recipes where the leftovers may have been even more delicious than the original recipe, so I had to share the version 2 with you! For lunch today I topped some rice with the leftover grilled vegetables, beans, cabbage and a dollop of the avocado cream sauce. It made the most delicious burrito bowl lunch!

Watch the quick video for an idea of how this recipe works.


Yield: Serves 4-6

Grilled Vegetable Tacos with Black Beans and Avocado Cream

Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 30 minutes

These colorful vegan black bean and grilled vegetable tacos are topped with an avocado cream sauce, pineapple, and cabbage.

Grilled Vegetable Tacos with Black Beans and Avocado Cream

Ingredients

  • 1 ¼ cups avocado flesh (about 1 large avocado)
  • 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice (about 2 limes)
  • 1 handful fresh cilantro leaves
  • ½ teaspoon garlic powder
  • ¾ teaspoon cumin
  • ½ teaspoon sea salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper, to taste
  • 3 tablespoons water, to thin
  • 2 red onions
  • 2 zucchini
  • 2 carrots
  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons taco seasoning, divided (store bought or homemade)
  • 3 rings or spears fresh pineapple
  • 2 cups cooked black beans
  • 1 package favorite tortillas, warmed
  • ¼ cup thinly sliced radish (for garnish)
  • 1 cup thinly sliced purple cabbage (for garnish)
  • 1 jalapeno, thinly sliced (for garnish, optional)

Instructions

  1. To make the avocado cream, place avocado, lime juice, cilantro, garlic powder, cumin, salt and a pinch of pepper in a blender. Blend until smooth, scraping down the sides with a rubber spatula and adding water to thin. Adjust seasoning to taste. Transfer to a bowl, cover, and store in the refrigerator.
  2. Cut zucchini and carrots in half lengthwise. Peel onion and cut crosswise into ½ to 1” rounds. Brush veggies and pineapple with olive oil and sprinkle the veggies lightly with about 1 tablespoon taco seasoning. Grill until charred marks appear and veggies are just tender crisp. Be careful not to over cook the veggies, as zucchini can get soggy. Grill the pineapple just until marks appear. Cut the grilled veggies and pineapple into bite-sized pieces.
  3. Meanwhile, heat the beans and the remaining tablespoon of taco seasoning in a small saucepan over medium-low heat.
  4. Fill tortillas with black beans and grilled veggies. Top with avocado cream, grilled pineapple, radish, cabbage, and jalapeno.

Notes

*Make-ahead tip: The veggies can be grilled and the avocado cream can be made in the morning. Reheat the veggies before serving.

Nutrition Information:
Yield: 6 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 271Total Fat: 12gSaturated Fat: 2gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 9gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 446mgCarbohydrates: 35gFiber: 11gSugar: 7gProtein: 9g