Learning to Make Tamales From a Pro

Several weeks ago I was lucky enough to be able to learn to make "autentico" tamales from this wonderful woman:

The first step was a trip to the mercado.

Masa de Tamal, Chile de Arbol, Tomatoes, Tomatillos, Jalapenos, Limes, Garlic, Queso Fresco and Corn Husks. Not pictured: Pork butt and chicken breasts.

 

And, of course, Lard. Very important!

Also, I didn't own a proper tamale steaming pot. Luz wasn't fond of my idea to just use the biggest pot I own and crumple up wads of tin foil to put in the bottom on which to set the tamales so they wouldn't be submerged in the water. As it turned out these enormous tamale pots happened to be on sale when we went to the store so I picked one up. After all, I'm going to need it in the future now that I've learned to make these scrumptious things.

The next step was getting the meat prepared. I had to do this before Luz showed up at my house because it was the most time consuming (and easiest) part. 

 

First the chicken: Put the chicken breasts into a pot filled with water until the chicken breasts are covered. Add a roughly chopped onion, some garlic and some salt. Let this all come to a simmer (like you're making chicken stock) and let it do it's thing for a couple of hours. And yes, cover the pot so that the water doesn't evaporate because you want to preserve the resulting stock for later in the tamale-making process.

 

For the pork: Just do the exact same thing as you did with the chicken breasts. But as I discovered, cutting the pork roast into smaller pieces speeds up this process. What I mean by "speeds up" is that it keeps it around 2 hours rather than 4-6.

Rinse the tomatillos well in water and then remove the leaves from them but don't throw the leaves away!

Put the tomatillo leaves in a pot of water and let them simmer for about 15-20 minutes. Then strain the leaves from the water, keeping the leaf-water for future use. Now you can throw the leaves away.

Put all of the tomatillos into a pot, cover with water (not too much - just to the top of the tomatillos) and throw in 3 jalapenos. Let this simmer for a while - until everything starts to get a bit mushy. Once they are good and ready, drain them from the water and put everything into a food processor. Add 2 garlic cloves and 1 tablespoon of salt. Process until smooth and your chile verde salsa is ready.

Once the meats are finished remove them from their stock, reserving all of the stock. Let the meat cool enough that you are able to shred it. 

Before you start with your dough, fill up your (clean) sink with lukewarm water and submerge your corn husks in it. This will soften them up for tamale wrapping. Just let them sit in the water while you do your other work.

In your stand mixer put two generous scoops of lard (manteca). Mix until "eyes" form. That's how Luz described it. Basically until there's lots of tiny little air bubbles all over. Then add about 2 cups of masa de tamal, 2 tablespoons of salt, 1 rounded tablespoon of baking powder, 5 tablespoons of the tomatillo leaf water (a natural pectin) and about a half cup of chicken or pork stock to start.(This one is a no-brainer - for chicken tamales, put the chicken stock into the dough, for pork tamales put the pork stock into the dough) Mix this all together very well. You'll probably need to add quite a bit more chicken or pork stock but start with a little at a time, mixing as you go until the mixture has the right consistency. Sort of like fluffy peanut butter. Once you think your tamale dough is ready to go you should get a glass of very cold water and gently take a small ball of dough and drop it in the glass of water. If it floats you're good to proceed, if it doesn't then you need to keep mixing your dough.

When your dough is ready, set up your tamale-making station. Pull your corn husks out of the water and gently towel dry and separate them. Put them into a pile for easy grabbing. Set out your bowls of dough, meat and salsa in a row. Grab a large corn husk, "paint" it with dough, leaving the top and one side free of dough. Put a scoop of chicken on the dough and then a spoonful of chile verde on the chicken and then wrap it up and set it with the open side up on the counter so the insides don't ooze out. Do this over and over and over and over again..... Until there's no more dough or meat or salsa left. For chicken tamales wrap them and you're done. For pork, tie them with a little "string" made out of husk. For cheese tamales, just make them slightly smaller. That way you can tell which is which after they've all been cooked.

Once you've finished assembling the tamales, fill the tamale pot with water until it nearly reaches the steaming grate. Gently set the uncooked tamales in the pot with the open sides up. Feel free to stack them on top of each other, just don't put them upside down. We put around 65 tamales into our giant pot. Bring the water to a boil and cover with a lid. Let them steam for 45-55 minutes. Then check them for doneness. If the husk easily peels away from the masa dough then they are done other wise put your tester back and keep steaming.

We made a batch each of chicken/green chile, pork/green chile, pork/red chile, vegetarian (queso fresco/jalepeno), and dessert (sweet dough with raisins as the filling). We colored the dough of the sweet tamales pink so that we could tell which ones were for dessert when we were done. (Omit the chicken/pork stock for these and just add tomatillo leaf water and regular water, but less liquid than for the other dough as this dough has sugar in it which lessens the need for more liquid.)

They were all incredibly delicious. Just like the ones I used to drool over in Ensenada, Mexico back when we lived in San Diego. Maybe even better. The whole process is very time consuming and messy - a real labor of culinary love - but well worth it. Plus, if you make a whole bunch you can just freeze them and have them as you wish in months to come. I figure I'll try to make these 2 times per year. 

By the way - to make the red chile, just put a bunch of tomatoes and a few dried pods of chile de arbol in a pot, just covering them with water and let them simmer until soft. Then put them into a food processor along with 2 cloves of garlic and salt, to taste. Blend until smooth. It's very similar to the process of making the green chile.