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December 21, 2002

What Did I Do?

Once there was a general consensus the tamale meat was spiced correctly, we began mixing the masa. The stew meat is one of the crucial points where it gets tricky having more than one cook in the kitchen. This was obvious when I talked to my two aunts about the tamale process. Both had different ingredients. One: "I have never put a jalepeno in tamales in my life!!!" The other: "You can cut up a little jalepeno to give it a little kick." For my tamales, I was very gung ho for adding lots more chili. Dad and his wife where not so much. In the end we settled for a compromise; the color looked good and I could always sneak some more in here and there. As we were stewing the meat, my Dad also began cleaning the hojas. This is a very important. My Grandmother insisted on soaking and cleaning the hojas three times before rolling the tamals. We bought hojas from the Sak n Save and they were beautiful. Nice big husks that were pretty clean to begin with. Still, we soaked and cleaned them three times.

The masa was tricky for me. I had only a vague recollection of what the texture should be.

Posted by mermu at December 21, 2002 09:34 AM

Comments

Meredith, if those tamales were the same that Granny Karl had, prepared and shared, they were great. Let us know if our preparation of them caused the Masa coating to stick to the Husks or did that happen in another's preparation of them? Enquiring minds want to know.. very tasty withal. Love, Clarkent

Posted by: Matthias at January 1, 2003 09:21 AM

I finally got to eat the fruits of our labour. They are yummy!!!!

Posted by: mom (aka Rita) at December 26, 2002 10:39 PM

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