Tamales

My sister and I thought it would be fun to make tamales for Thanksgiving this year. We had made them together once before and thought they turned out really yummy, so we decided to do a Mexican Thanksgiving.

Tamales are a difficult thing to make. It's kind of something you get better at the more you do it - like an art. Traditionally, Mexican women learn early how to make tamales for their husbands and families. They are made for special occasions, such as parties and holidays.

You start by making a chicken stock with 3-4 lbs. fresh chicken in 2.5 quarts cold water with 1 large celery rib, 1 green onion, 2 carrots, 1 yellow onion, 1 bunch cilantro stems, 4-5 garlic cloves, .5 tsp. pepper, and 1 tsp. salt. Bring all of this to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for one hour.

You will use the chicken for the chicken filling. We also put a roast in the crock-pot with salt, pepper, onion, and garlic for the beef filling. You can also do pork (which is what the classic tamale is made of), but we didn't.

The next step is to make the Red Chile Sauce. Mix 5 cups of the chicken broth; 1 lb. tomatoes, quartered; 12 oz. white onions, quartered; 6 cloves whole peeled garlic; 6 oz. dried New Mexico chiles, stemmed and seeded; one Tbsp. butter, at room temperature; 1 tsp. salt.


In a stock pot over high heat, bring the stock, tomatoes, onions, and garlic to a boil. Cook for 15 minutes.


Stir the dried chiles into the stock, making sure it covers them. Remove the pan from heat and soak chiles for 15 minutes.

When the mixture is cool, transfer it to a blender until liquefied. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve, pressing on the residue with the back of a ladle to extract all of the chile flavor.

In a large saucepan, reheat the sauce and stir in the butter until it is melted. Stir in the salt.

Now you are ready to add the shredded chicken to half the Mexico Red Chile sauce, .5 tsp. ground cumin, and .25 tsp. cayenne pepper. Do the same with the shredded beef.


Start soaking your corn husks, as they will need to soak in water for 20 minutes before you can use them.

You can either buy prepared masa or make it yourself by using a bag of Masa flour and a 3 lb. tub of Crisco. Mix it all together, then divide into two equal parts. To one part add 1 cup of the beef broth, and to the other half add one cup of the chicken stock. We thought the masa turned out a little too dry, so I would recommend adding more stock. The way to test the masa is to wet your fist in water and press it into the dough; the dough should leave no residue on your hands.


Here are the chicken meat mixture and the beef mixture with the masa mixture.

Next, take a corn husk and place the rough side down, away from you, so that the smoother side is facing you. Place about a quarter cup of the dough on the corn husk. Spread it out over the husk, leaving 1/2-inch borders along the sides. Spoon 1/4 cup of filling down the center of the masa.







This next part we didn't do so well. Lift the sides of the corn husk up to meet each other in the center, and gently press to seal the masa together, making a tube shape that encases the filling. The corn husk should wrap around the roll, but not be embedded in the masa or touching the filling. (We didn't do it exactly like that, but it didn't hurt anything in the outcome.) Fold the top edge of the husk over the end of the roll.




Cover the tamales with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours.



We put them in this roaster with a couple inches of water in the bottom and covered them with tin foil. Bake at 350 for about 1 hour.



Here is the end result with queso, refried beans, guacamole, and chips. We also served stuffed peppers, enchiladas, salsa, sour cream, and rice...



...and pies.



And the girls had to relax with their parents' laptops after a yummy meal.

And a Good Time Was Had By All

Here is a hodge-podge of my week. I probably should break this post down into several, or just spare you the ramblings all-together, but I'm not going to. I did, however, spare you all from a cute, little song I learned while growing up about getting wet and being bad and drinking tea. Even though it would have been very appropriate right about now.

We went canoeing this week. The last time we went canoeing, I was six months pregnant, and we didn't know how to do much of anything but run into the bullrushes. This time we did much better about not running into the vegetation. That's only because there was no vegetation. Instead, we were in a group and kept running into other people's boats.

I am not sure how much I should say about this whole thing or not. The whole subject is a very volatile one. It has something to do with who is better at handling a canoe than someone else, but that someone else doesn't think that is the case, and the who doesn't want to hurt the someone else's feelings (although the who was quite adept at telling the someone else everything he/she was doing wrong). So we will just leave it at that.

Van said if we got out of it alive and with our marriage in tact, we were never going canoeing again.

I found a wonderful recipe for CHOCOLATE DESSERT that I can eat on my low iodine diet. I am so excited. This is a very fun cake to make, and it doesn't take any eggs or milk. The cocoa powder is okay to have because it isn't milk chocolate.

Wacky Cake
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
3 Tablespoons cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 Tablespoons oil
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup cold water
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Sift together flour,
sugar, cocoa, soda, and salt into an 8 x 8 inch baking
pan or dish. Mix thoroughly. Make 3 holes in the
dry ingredients. Place oil in first hole, vinegar in
second hole, and vanilla in third hole. Pour water
over all and mix well. Spread batter evenly in pan
and bake in the dish that batter was mixed in. Bake
30 minutes or until center is firm. Cool.

I made a frosting by getting Ghirardelli dark chocolate chips (they don't have dairy in them and are worth their weight in gold), about two tablespoons of non-dairy butter (I can't remember the name and I don't feel like getting up and looking in the fridge right now), and a little bit of coconut milk. I melted that concoction in the microwave and poured it over the cake...simply DIVINE!!!

I have had a lot of fun quilting with a friend this week. We went to a Minnesota Shop Hop a while back. It's where you get a "pass-port" with 85 quilt shops from all over Minnesota, and you try to hit them all and get a stamp. You can turn your passport in for all sorts of prizes that don't even come close to what you've spent in time and gas money. We ran into some real die-hard quilters. They had their R.V.s and were tooling all over Minnesota so they could fill their passports and get their prizes.

No, we did not go to all 85, you silly people! We only went to seven. Each shop gives you a different block pattern, a piece of Minnesota-themed material, and, if you spend $10.00, a charm for your bracelet. It's kind of silly, but I felt like I was on a treasure hunt. And if you're into quilting, it's so much fun to browse the shops. Quilts are actually magnificent pieces of art.

I am still working on the same quilt I've been working on for...ahem...two years now. It's a stack-and-whack. I've gotten all the blocks done; now, I'm just working on piecing everything together. I really wish I could work on it more because it is so relaxing and fun. Sometimes, while my machine is purring away, I think, "Wow. This is wonderful. Why don't I do this more often." Then, my life and my schedule smack me up-side the head, and I become ever so aware of why I don't do it more often. It's a shame, really.

Well, this is becoming very long-winded. My mother always said I had diarrhea of the mouth. So, I will just leave you with the link to the sermon I promised you a few weeks ago. It is one of my favorite sermons by my favorite preacher-man.