Feliz Navidad - Tamale Time

My lovely sister-in-law, Aislynn, is half Mexican, which means we get to pretend to be Mexican at Christmas and help her make tamales!  YUM!  Aislynn did most of the hard work (cooking the pork the night before and making the Masa).  My father-in-law, David, and I just helped her assemble the tamales on Christmas Eve.  We enjoyed eating them on Christmas Day with our other Mexican themed fare.

Here are some pics from our tamale making day:



Autumn with her favorite Tia (okay her only "Tia").

 

Beginning the tamale making process.
Notice the new ceiling in my kitchen (thanks Andrew!)



Masa!



Pulled pork.



Assembly line time.

 

Papa helping his "girls" (minus 1 - where were you Allison?) make tamales.

 

Step 1 - Start with a corn husk (you must soak these the day before, so they are pliable).



Step 2 - Spread Masa on the flat end of the husk in a square approx 4in by 4in.

 

Step 2 cont - spreading the Masa.

 

Step 3 - Add the pork (or other filling) on the Masa.

 

Step 4 - Begin to roll tightly.

 

Step 5 - Tuck the "tail" into the roll.

 

Step 6 - Roll some more.

 

Voila! (or however they say that in Spanish)

 

We made about 5 dozen in total - and they were YUMMY!

 

Lexy hanging out on my diaper bag while we work.

 If you plan to make tamales I highly recommend looking up a "how to" video on YouTube.  This helped us considerably.  Calls to Tia's Mommy also helped! :-)