Tamales at La Poblana

I decided to try my first tamal at La Poblana, a food truck serving Mexican Puebla cuisine. La Poblana is located on 3rd street by Bear’s Place and is very conveniently located for IU students and faculty to grab lunch. It has been one of my go-to lunch places this semester and I have never been disappointed in the many different menu items I have tried, including their chorizo quesadilla, which is my favorite 🙂

Back to tamales, I walked up to the food truck and was instantly greeted with all of the lovely smells that come out of a Mexican food truck *sigh*

I got in line at La Poblana, waiting to order two of their tamales. They only offer one kind of filling, pollo. When ordering, I was asked if I wanted cheese and sour cream on my tamales, and I said, “yes”. I want to try these tamales in the way they are usually served, so if cheese and sour cream are what La Poblana’s version of tamales comes with, I wanted it.

I then waited eagerly for my tamales and once I got them, I quickly walked to find a lunch spot, outside in a slightly secluded area so I could enjoy my lunch of tamales.

The tamales came with melted cheese and sour cream on top, as promised. They were also wrapped in banana leaves. From my research, tamales are usually either wrapped in banana leaves or corn husks. First looks, alone, these tamales looked delectable. Then, my first bite: the warm masa dough was amazing. However, I was wondering where the filling was…

Looking closer, the tamales were mostly masa dough with a few bits of the delicious spicy pollo filling. Personally, I was expecting a closer filling to dough ratio, so I was disappointed about the lack of filling here. However, the masa dough was moist and the chicken filling was very flavorful, similar to chicken tinga filling. The bites I had with both dough and filling were wonderful, but with the large portion of the tamales being masa dough, I ended up not finishing all of my tamales. The masa dough was on the bland side, as well. The little documentary I watched showed spices being added to the masa dough. This masa dough tasted like a less sweet cornbread, and did not have much flavor or spice on its own. I think that if the masa dough had been more flavorful and spicy, I would have enjoyed these tamales much more.

So, overall, I was disappointed in my wonderful food truck, who had never disappointed me before today. But, I reminded myself to keep an open mind since I went into this project knowing about the large variety of tamales in Mexico alone. So, even though this tamal from La Poblana wasn’t my favorite due to a lack of filling and spice in the masa dough, I am very glad to include in this project to highlight the uniqueness of every tamal that I try.