What goes in a tamale?

A

ajax

100+ Posts
Seriously, I haven't been back to Texas in so long I've forgotten. I just got tamales for lunch and I swear they had, along with the meat, carrots, potatoes, and sliced bell peppers in there. Is that normal?

I'm used to just meat and seasoning inside the corn. After my initial shock, I managed to force everything down. It wasn't particularly bad, it just tasted wrong. And I didn't get them at some pansy CalMex place either, it was a hole in the wall where the folks barely spoke English so I'm wondering if it's just a different kind of tamale.

Just for the record - it was whole baby carrots, potatoes sliced into sticks, and sliced bell peppers.
 
SF?


Well there you go! no telling what other **** was in there.


Cuban tamales are weird too. When I first got here I was craving me some tamales and got some "pork" ones and they were square and tied with a string.
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I cooked em and bit into one and WTF? where's the pork? it was all masa and no pork that I could detect and then I found a speck of pork. Evidently Cubans mix up a lot of masa and a little meat and stuff that in a corn shuck and steam it. They were tasty though.

I found Wal-mart has frozen Deli-mex tamales that are ok.

and real tamales can be stuffed with pretty much anything, rasins, chicken, bean & cheeze, whatever you want, never heard of carrots & potatoes though.
 
Technically, the singular is "tamal," the plural is "tamales." Of course, the distinction is meaningless, because who in the hell ever eats just one? Sorry, pointless spanish lesson now over.

For traditional tex-mex tamales, the filling is pork and seasoning (salt, chiles, etc.). That's it. In recent decades, beef has also become an acceptable meat. Chicken, bean and cheese are bastardizations that are becoming accepted, but not by me.

However, many different Latin American cultures have their own version of tamales. I remember the first time I had them at the house of my childhood best friend, who was Honduran. Raisins? Really? But they were good. Other than the fact that they involved masa, filling, and steaming inside of some sort of leaf, they were nothing like tex-mex tamales.

Oaxacan tamales are also different -- often wider, wrapped in a banana leaf, etc.

Gotta say that carrots, taters, and peppers is a new one to me -- where are the folks from?
 
So were there beans in the tamale or not? Were they served with spaghetti? Were they from a chain restaurant? How much did you tip the waitress? Theoretically, if you bought them at Sonic, would you have tipped the waitress? What if she was attractive? If you were undercharged for your wedding tamales would you go back and pay the balance? What if the people at the tamale place were a-holes? Did you hear what Rome said about tamales?
 
I once ate a white chocolate tamal. I'm somewhat of a traditionalist and just because its wrapped in a shuck doesn't make it a tamal in my mind, but this falls into the same category as the inane "sauce or no sauce" or "beans in chili" debates. Eat what you like and spit it out if its nasty.

And don't tip at Sonic or McDonalds.
 
Lard, lots of lard.

Went to a good old-fashioned tamalada last month supervised by my friend's mom from Brownsville. It's not a real tamalada unless there's a bossy Hispanic woman overseeing the process.
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We did put an assload of whipped lard in the masa mix. Fillings were chicken & green chile, bean, cheese & jalepeno, and shredded pork (with and without raisins).

Carrots, potatoes and bell peppers? Well, that just ain't right...
 
Drag, as to tex-mex tamales, you are right -- the traditional tamalada involved cooking the hog's head, which wasn't used for much else. However, as making tamales became a bigger production, and dozens upon dozens were made, cooking 4 heads wasn't practical. So, buy a few boston butt pork roasts, and you're in business.

I remember making them with family with a hog's head, and some roasts to fill out the need for more meat.
 
<quote>I always thought authentic tamales were made from hog head<quote>

That's what I thought, too. At least when I was working at HEB years and years ago, when I'd see that hog head coming down the belt I knew it was for tamales. What else?
 
Best tamales I ever made were from Nilgai meat. I don't think you can put too much manteca (lard) in a tamale.

From time to time I also make tamales with chorizo that are as big as a baked potato. It's fairly dry and you cut it open like you would a baked potato and dump in a passilla corn chowder. One will do you for a day or two. I've also done a variation with venison and then a cranberry sauce. It's really quite tasty. It's not an authentic tamal, but it's a good meal.

One of the more interesting catfights you will witness in San Antonio is the argument over where to buy the best tamales. We have quite a few places to buy them and around Christmas time people will camp out to get them fresh. It's like people camping out for concert tickets or Rose (or whatever) Bowl tickets.
 
Man, I dunno about this hog head stuff. I'm sure I've unwittingly eaten some in the past and liked it, but it just sounds pretty hardcore to me.

The same place that makes the carrot tamale also makes a kickass breakfast burrito. A breakfast burrito with hot salsa and strong black coffee is just about the perfect breakfast. I'll never get their tamales again though.
 
ajax, do you like barbacoa? just replace "hog" with "cow". i don't care where it came from as long as it tastes good cooked.
 
An old lady used to come by our shop selling chicken tamales. Chicken, cheese, a little jalepeno, mmmmmm good.
 
i don't know but the family in Acres Homes has been selling tamales for over 50 years and they are the shiznit. $7 a dozen. sells out every friday... (i think he only takes phone orders now.)
 
I think you can put just about anything in tamales. Like others, I have not seen carrots, potatoes, etc. as filling ingredients.

I have seen several TV chefs make dessert tamales. He does not add the savory seasons to the masa dough for dessert tamales.

The filling for tamales is like toppings for pizzas. Whatever you like is good. Whatever is locally available is a good filling for tamales.
 
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