Tamales in the 'Shire

Ever feel like you're just hanging around, waiting to see what will happen next in your life? Things aren't necessarily bad, but the whole time you're walking around with this queasy feeling - you can almost sense that a big change is coming and you're not sure if it'll be for the good. Or maybe your life looks kind of like this:

Plenty of room for the wind to blow through, but at least the roof's still on!

And then one day you wake up to find that it now looks like this:



Buh-bye.


Well, maybe I'm over-dramatizing. At least, that's a picture of what life has felt like the past few days, whenever I allowed myself think about things. You know, it's true what they say: thinking is highly overrated.

As usual, I turned to food to take my mind off the harder stuff. Tamales, specifically. And hibiscus tea, but more on that later. Tamales always make me think of my hometown. I'm actually not sure why, since I don't think we really ate them very often growing up, and we definitely didn't make them. But plenty of people did, and sold them frozen by the bag. I bet they still do.

My tamales are always an improvisation. I basically follow the directions on the side of the Maseca bag, but I don't use lard, and I don't fill them with shredded pork. The filling just depends on what I've got lying around the house, and this time, I filled them with....drumroll please... collard greens! And sharp cheddar cheese and pickled jalapenos and carrots. And they were AMAZING!!!

I brought them to a meeting of Dining For Women and the ladies were very pleased. I also made some garlicky black beans in the pressure cooker to spoon over the tamales. Added some avocado, and I'm pretty sure we achieved Mexican food bliss.

Here's how I made them, along with some step-by-step photos since the side of the Maseca bag doesn't include pictures.

Tamales for about 8-10 people:

If you're going to make the same filling I made, the first thing to do is cook the collard greens. Wash them, cut into smallish pieces, then dump into a medium pot with about 2 inches of water in the bottom. Cover, bring to a boil and simmer about 45 minutes. This step is best done ahead of time and here is a warning: while they cook your house will smell a bit like wet dog.

Take a bag of dry corn husks (found in a Mexican grocery) and soak the husks in water in a large bowl. There are usually around 16 husks. While they soak, prepare the tamales.

Mix well:

• 4 cups Maseca or other brand of tamale flour (it's made from corn soaked in lime)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt

Pour in and mix with a spatula or your hands (traditional) to make a soft dough:

• 4 cups lukewarm vegetable broth

In a separate bowl, beat until creamy:

• 1 cup softened butter
• 1/3 cup canola oil

Add the butter mixture to the flour mixture and beat until it's fully incorporated. Set the bowl aside while you finish the filling. To make the filling, you will need the collard greens, plus:

• 2 garlic cloves, pressed
• 1 pound shredded extra sharp cheddar cheese
• 1 small can pickled jalapenos, drained

In a medium skillet, saute the garlic in a bit of olive or canola oil for a minute on medium-low heat:

Add the pre-cooked collard greens (drained well) and stir well with the garlic. Add about 1/4 tsp salt. Cook for about 5-10 minutes until it smells good. Set aside to cool briefly.

Shred the cheese. I like to do this with the food processor to speed things along. Actually, what I do is first puree the jalepenos in the processor, then I just add the cheese a few chunks at a time until it's all shredded.

Remove the cheese from the processor and mix it in a large bowl with the collard greens.

Take a corn husk and lay it down flat. Spoon out maybe 1/3 cup of tamale dough and press down into the center of the husk. Take a large spoonful of filling and flatten it out down the middle. Looks like this:

Take about 1/4 cup of tamale dough and press onto the top of the filling to cover it. Begin to fold the corn husk up on the sides to shape the dough so it will seal in the filling, like this:

Like putting on a baby's diaper. Minus the screaming.

Fold up the sides, then the top and bottom of the corn husk. It will not want to stay closed, so hold it all together with your fingers until you can lay it folded side down in the pot. The pot should be wide, have about an inch of water in the bottom, and have a stainless steel strainer or ideally, one of those collapsible steel vegetable steamers in the bottom so that the tamales won't fall into the water. If you don't have a lid, you will need to use aluminum foil to seal in the steam. Repeat the steps above to make each tamale and keep layering them in the pot (or use two pots if you run out of room) until all the dough and filling is gone.



To bed you go, my sweets!



Turn the heat to high so that the water comes to a boil, then turn down to low with the cover on. The tamales should steam for at least 1-1/2 hours, but I usually do 2 hours since it's a large batch.

Note: When you take them out, the tamales will be very hot. Also, if you try to eat them right away, they will want to fall apart. It's far more satisfying, if you can control yourself, to let them rest for about a half hour in the husks, and then when you open them up the little bundles will be nicely firm and are sure to impress those lucky enough to be dining with you!

And finally, the beverage - hibiscus tea. At least that's what I've always called it - though the label says "Flor de Jamaica" and the tea, which is tart and quite red, bears a very close resemblence to a sweetened drink I enjoyed while traveling in Francophone West Africa (Burkina, Cote d'Ivoire, etc.). That drink was called "bissap", apparently from the bissap flower, whatever that is. Another close cousin to this drink is one that is served hot and highly sweetened in Egypt, where it is actually called hibiscus tea.

Hey, wait! Stop the presses! I looked up bissap on wikipedia just now and would you believe it, it actually is all the same thing! How did I know this? It's astonishing how sometimes you can be talking out of your you-know-what, and you actually do get it right. Wow, I am shocked. Anyway, whatever you call it and however you found out about it, this tea is definitely a perfect drink to go along with your tamales. And I have to say, it's not too bad spiked with vodka or made into a white wine spritzer, either. Cheers!