Sweet Tamales

Last week Robert, Tiffany, and Ethan came over for chili. After dinner Ethan and Ross made yellow cake cookies. They all came over again this past Sunday (for Indian food), and Ethan helped me make sweet tamales. I made the plain masa ahead of time and Ethan added and stirred in the rest of the ingredients. Ethan liked the raw masa, but once cooked, he said he didn't like it. I think he was just really tired and would rather play MarioKart than sit down to eat dessert.

When I was little my mom would make these for me with sugar and raisins. She made these tropical sweet tamales a few weeks ago, and I had been wanting to try and make some myself.

Sweet Tamales

masa--this can be bought pre-mixed or as a powder that you mix with water, baking soda, salt, and fat. I have the powder and used pineapple juice from the canned pineapple in place of some of the water, and butter instead of vegetable shortening.
one large can crushed pineapple
shredded coconut
brown sugar
sugar (or snow, as Ethan called it)
cinnamon
nutmeg
allspice
vanilla

corn husks (ojas)
pot
steam rack

You know me, I don't measure. I let Ethan dump/shake/pour in the ingredients and stir the mixture until it tasted good. I added the pineapple in last. I don't think the order matters that much though. Well, here are some more detailed instructions.

1. Drain pineapple. Juice can be used to make masa.

2. If using powder, prepare masa according to directions on package (using 2 c of corn). The masa can be made ahead of time. Cover with plastic and refrigerate until ready to use.

3. Soak ojas in hot or warm water for a few minutes. Separate and clean the husks, leaving them to soak in the water to soften.

4. Add sugar (I think Ethan added about half a cup of brown sugar and one cup of regular), vanilla (2 tsp.) and spices to masa and mix thoroughly.

5. Add shredded coconut and drained pineapple and mix again.

6. Taste the mix and make sure it is yummy--if not add more sugar, and/or spices.

7. Place steam rack into the pot and add some water. My dad says it is best if the boiling water doesn't actually touch the tamales.

7. Stuff, roll, and fold the tamales and pack them into the pot. The last batch of tamales I made with my mom really oozed out the top, so this time I tried to leave some room at the top of each tamale for expansion. This step works best if one person rolls the tamales while a second person alternates between separating the ojas and packing the tamales into the pot. Tiffany was nice enough to help me with this step while Ethan played LEGOs with Uncle Ross.

8. Cover the pot and steam the tamales for about an hour. Check the water periodically and add more when it gets low.

For some more photos check out my other tamales post. Hmmm. I think I'll have a tamale now.

Tamales

I'm so far behind...I'm going to try and catch up a little at a time. Before my mom and I left for Vegas we made some tamales so that Ross would have something to eat while we were gone. Instead of making them traditionally by layering the masa and the filling we just mixed it all together and packed it into the husk. I say we, but my mom really did most of the work. I separated the husks and packed the tamales into the pan.

So, here's how we did it. We made two different kinds...one with chicken, cheese and poblano peppers (the ones we roasted the week before) and the other with black beans and cheese. First we made the masa. I bought some kind of masa mix at the store, and we had to add fat and water. Instead of lard we used a 50/50 mix of vegetable shortening and butter. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the rest of that Crisco. We also added some chile powder and spices to the masa to give it some color and flavor. Meanwhile we were soaking the husks in some hot water to soften them up. My mom deboned a roasted chicken from the store and used that in half of the tamales. She cooked up the beans from scratch. After the masa was ready we mixed it with what would have been the filling. My mom formed a little log and rolled it up in the corn husk. I packed them into the pot which had water at the bottom and a rack to hold the tamales. We ended up cooking the tamales for about an hour and a half. After letting them cool a bit I took them out of the pot and packed them into containers for the refrigerator. The next day we actually packed them in baggies and put most of them in the freezer.

I preferred the bean and cheese and Ross preferred the chicken. He said he ate about a dozen while we were gone with the leftover black beans. I bet they would have been really good with some Spanish quinoa.