Tofu comes in a variety of ways: water packed (refrigerated, Nasoya and Soyboy brands for example), aseptic packed silken (Mori Nu brand, usually), and baked are common types. Baked tofus are usually flavored (like BBQ or Asian Style) and are good for recipes where you already want that flavor. The Aseptic packed silken tofus are good for desserts, smoothies and cream type sauces, but not for stir fries or replacing meat in things. For your needs, I would recommend a firm or extra firm water packed tofu. You don't want it to say silken anywhere on it. It's not the same thing.
Tofu out of the package has a sort of... soft, wet, cheese texture. Not so much like meat. It doesn't taste like anything either. You should prepare you tofu by draining and pressing it. You slice it into the thickness you need, put it on a few paper towels or a kitchen towel on a plate or a cookie sheet, then another towel layer, and another nested plate or cookie sheet on top. Then put something heavy on top. A few cans of soup, a cast iron pan, or a kettle of water are popular choices. Leave it for at least 30 minutes. Now your tofu is ready for... whatever. Marinate it in the fridge a while if you want, and bake or stir fry it.
In your case, you want some crumbled up tofu for tacos. You could just crumble it up after you press it and mix the taco seasoning with a little water and cook it up together. Often for ground meat substitute, frozen tofu is good. It comes out much chewier. Once you've pressed it, put it in the freezer until frozen solid, then thaw it in the fridge, press it AGAIN (lets off a lot more water) crumble, cook with taco seasoning as above. Frozen tofu comes out looking spongy and is a dark yellow/light brown color. that's normal.
Tofu out of the package has a sort of... soft, wet, cheese texture. Not so much like meat. It doesn't taste like anything either. You should prepare you tofu by draining and pressing it. You slice it into the thickness you need, put it on a few paper towels or a kitchen towel on a plate or a cookie sheet, then another towel layer, and another nested plate or cookie sheet on top. Then put something heavy on top. A few cans of soup, a cast iron pan, or a kettle of water are popular choices. Leave it for at least 30 minutes. Now your tofu is ready for... whatever. Marinate it in the fridge a while if you want, and bake or stir fry it.
In your case, you want some crumbled up tofu for tacos. You could just crumble it up after you press it and mix the taco seasoning with a little water and cook it up together. Often for ground meat substitute, frozen tofu is good. It comes out much chewier. Once you've pressed it, put it in the freezer until frozen solid, then thaw it in the fridge, press it AGAIN (lets off a lot more water) crumble, cook with taco seasoning as above. Frozen tofu comes out looking spongy and is a dark yellow/light brown color. that's normal.
