Around the World #2: Green Chile Chicken Tamales

Goodness me! Did I really make Tamales? From scratch? Yes ..And that too on a weeknight after work? I must be crazy!  Well  a little bit crazy perhaps… but I did have a reason for doing what I did – trying to make tamales on a weeknight! And the reason was that I had soaked corn husks in water over last weekend when I had planned to prepare an elaborate Mexican meal. It was very ambitious and hence I couldn’t finish making everything on my list – I got only as far as – tostadas, chicken enchiladas with a green chillie and tomatillo sauce and guava rolls. And then on Sunday hubby dear ordered me to stay out of the kitchen since it was Mother’s day!  That’s why I couldn’t get to my tamales….alas! And hence all Monday morning at work I kept worrying about my corn husks rotting having been soaked for over 48 hours then. So I came home determined to work on my tamales. I took the over soaked corn husks out of the refrigerator.  I had some cooked chicken left over from the weekend when I had made the enchiladas. So all I had to make was the tamale batter and the sauce and then steam them. How hard could that be, right? Wrong.

As I was getting the ingredients for the tamale batter ready, the electrician who had been working on our new room addition walked into the kitchen and disabled all the kitchen electrical outlets. So no electric mixer for making the batter. I was still unfazed – no problemo, I shall use my wooden spoon for the mixing! And so I made the masa harina dough using my hands and then added butter and chicken stock to it all the time stirring vigorously with my spoon. I managed to get the batter ready. Done. All happy.

Then I put some tomatillos and green chillies in the oven to broil. Got them out of the oven and then remembered that I had no electricity in my kitchen. Again the fierce determination took over. I picked up my food processor and walked over to the dining room and whirred it up. Voila, sauce ready!

Now the assembly – so I spread out all the ingredients for my tamale on the kitchen counter – the batter, the chicken and the sauce. I take one husk and start to spread the batter on it when my doorbell rings and my contractor enters. The gentleman that he is he pretends to ignore the mess on my kitchen counter but he has to talk to me about things and at first I stop my assembly work and give him undivided attention. But after a few minutes as I realize the clock ticking by, I resume my work whilst still talking to him. Did I imagine the quizzical look on his face? oh never mind.!

Anyways fortunately my husband gets home and he is able to answer the contractor’s questions and also manages to get him out of my kitchen! Finally I breathe a sigh of relief. And finish assembling the tamales and steam them in batches in my makeshift steamer using a sieve pan and a large pot with a lid.

We had the tamales along with some left over rice and lentil curry from the weekend which was also the reason I decided to embark on this rather proud tamale mission on a Monday night.  But the climax of my story – Ooh la la – Soft, spongy tamales ! I have had tamales only once before while on vacation in Mexico and I have to say that my tamales tasted better than what I had over there. Mind you, I am not bragging …hardly that. Just being factual 🙂 No seriously, these came out so good – soft and airy coating of the corn meal dough and delicious, spicy chicken filling inside! The chicken stock I used for the tamale batter was the home made one from cooking the chicken with the mexican spices and I think that imparted additional flavor to the tamales. I also had some bean puree left over from the weekend when I had made tostadas. So I also made a couple tamales using the blackbean puree as filling and they turned out tasty too!

And here’s how you make them. Make sure you have no distractions like I did! 🙂 I am bringing these tamales to Angie’s for the Fiesta Friday! This week’s party will be wild with Justine from Eclectic Odds n Sods and Jess from The Not so creative cook as the co-hosts! Happy weekend all!

 

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