Tag: tamales

Made it to Oregon..

Well, I hope to be out of the KC area by the middle of May. Thence to Salem, Oregon. I’ll not miss Brownbackistan one whit. I will have a place to garden and to have a smoker again. No more apartment cooking. Yahoo!

torito
The carniceria closest to us in Salem. El Torito.

Will be glad to be there..  real strawberries.. not those cardboard ones from Las Califas.  Serious wineries, more craft brewing. Hell, I may get me a cajun cooker, too. Quien sabe?

tacos
Tacos from El Sureño. A block from El Torito

Tamales from Carniceria Camecuaro

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when I picked up a half dozen tamales for our lunch at Carniceria Camecuaro. I was expecting them to be in hojas de maiz (corn husks), but they were wrapped in banana leaves. These turned out to be estilo salvadoreño and were full of chicken & vegetables. Sort of like a chicken pot pie, but better.

Camecuaro
This is a block south of Independence, behind GRINGO LOCO #2

Here’s a series of photos of one of these tamales.

tamale 1
Just opened

Nearly done…

tamale 2
Muy sabroso.

The vegetables included corn, potato, carrots, & poblano chile. The banana leaf wrapper adds a different flavor to the tamale; it’s more earthy than the regular hoja de maiz wrapper.

Everything for tamales.. and baluts, too!

Boy howdy! I’ve been seeing how easy it is to procure tamale-making materials and hardware here in Kansas City. The tiendas and carnicerias in the barrio where I live have several models of tamale steamers for sale. Here’s the bucket version, which probably works well on a cajun Cooker.

steamer
Bucket type tamale steamer

Of course, there are several options for masa, from the Maseca & Masa Harina commercial brands and the stores sell five-pound plastic bags of fresh tamale masa.

masa
prepared masa

And the hojas de maiz are readily available nearly everywhere. I was at the big Asian supermarket downtown a few days before Christmas and Latinas were buying scads of packaged frozen banana leaves “para tamales de Navidad”. Just down the aisle I found a display of baluts (a Filipino bar snack of unborn duck eggs) right next to the durians. Nummers.

stinky
durian

So fill up your steamers with tamales, folks!

in steamer
In the steamer.

Buen provecho, y’all. Y un prospero año nuevo!