Making Tamales: Part Two
Welcome Back!
It is now time to assemble the tamales! After watching a couple videos and reading through Isabel’s directions, I thought I had a grasp on what I needed to do in order to assemble the tamales.
First, I grabbed a corn husk, spread some masa on it, leaving the top 1/3 empty since this would be folded over.
Then, I added a scoop of the filling before folding it as tightly as possible to keep it together while it was steaming.
My first folded tamal!
Then, I repeated the process until the steamer was nearly full:
Then, I placed the steamer into the pot with water in the bottom. I brought this to medium-high heat.
The tamales were supposed to steam for about 3.5 hours. However, in Isabel’s directions, it didn’t say anything about adding water to the bottom of the pot during the process. My mom and I started smelling something burning about 2 hours into the process and realized that all of the water in the pot had boiled off and the pot itself was burning. So, my mom scrubbed out the charred bits in the bottom of the pot and added more water and they continued steaming. So, my only criticism of Isabel’s recipe is that water should probably be added every hour of the tamal-steaming process, so keep this in mind if you try her recipe.
Anyway, after that little bit of stress, the tamales were done steaming after about 3 hours:
The first tamal I took out to see if they were done slipped right out of its corn husk. Isabel said that the tamales will be done when they easily peel away from their corn husks, so this was great. I took the rest of them out and got the table set up for dinner.
Once my family was all there, we tried the tamales.
Everyone loved them, especially me! I definitely did my “happy food dance” after eating these tamales! I am so proud that they turned out well. These weren’t easy to make, but the final product definitely pays off. Actually, I was about to tell my dad at dinner that “the tamales weren’t that hard to make”, but then I stopped myself because they were a labor and time intensive process. However, after trying one of them, I totally forgot about all of the hard work that went into them because they tasted so delicious!
These were definitely a hit and I will be making tamales again for my family and friends in the future! In my next post, I reflect on this project, what I have learned, and how it will influence me in the future. Stay tuned!
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