Tamales

I've done the tamale thing now for several years on and off, serving mostly as labor who spreads the masa on the shucks. While this could be drudgery, it is usually accompanied by copious amounts of alcohol, plenty of good food and quality time spent with family. But with our head tamale chef (Sylvia, my mother-in-law) in St. Louis for Christmas, it was either go it alone or no tamales this year.

So, after a bit of thinking and then planning (and then calculating, as in "how many people can I trick into coming over to help spread the masa?) I decided that we would give it a go. I knew that mom would always be at least a phone call away, and also I remembered that last year she had discovered that you could buy masa that was pre-mixed, meaning that the hardest part of the job (in my experience) was already done for you.

So the first part is planning and shopping. I knew a partial list of stuff I would need: masa, shucks, a pork roast and chiles. Patty called around and found a few places that sold masa pre-mixed so I knew that I could get it. With my confidence in place, I started to make plans.

I ended up going to Fiesta Mart to attempt to get everything. This was on Christmas Eve eve, i.e. the 23rd. It was evening, but I figured that things wouldn't be too bad. Of course I was wrong, but nothing new there...

When we arrived (Bailey was with me, as I was bringing her home from swim practice) we headed to Fiesta. I bribed her by promising to buy her ojarascas, which she really likes. We showed up around 6:45 in the evening and the place was packed. We had to park a ways across the lot and then make our way in through the thronging patrons. Now if you've never been to Fiesta it's and experience. It's about as much of a third-world experience as you can get in Austin, expecially when it's crowded. They sell just about everything: clothing, luggage, cds, in addition to all of the strange foods that you could imagine. As we made our way into the store the tamale making stuff was front and center. And middle center and back center... Five pound bags of masa, lard in ever imaginable measure from one pound up to huge buckets, bags 0f dried chiles of all types: anchos, pasillas, cascabels, Guajillo, etc. I picked up a few things that I knew we needed (based on a call to Sylvia earlier in the day). This included a bag of ancho chiles, and a few heads of garlic. I searched high and low for the pre-mixed masa and also for a decent pork roast (shoulder or butt) but no luck. However, if I wanted a pig's head, well then there are more than enough to go around. I wanted to ask at the meat counter, but it would have taken 20 minutes just to wade through the line, so I gave up and picked up the few things that I had already and vowed to come back early in the morning. Oh, and they were out of ojarascas too...

to be continued...