It’s finally time for Tamale Assembly. You did all the prep. You bought all the ingredients. It’s time to make the margaritas, await your guests, and learn how to build those tamales. At the bottom of the tutorial, there’s a plan of attack that gives you a timeline of how to pull off the party, stress free. Also, if you’re going to make all three fillings, keep in mind you need to make three batches of the tamale dough before you even think about Tamale Assembly.
Tamale Party Plan of Attack:
Day 1:
Make Salsas and Fillings- note which can be done at the same time. For example, roasting the tomatillos for the salsa and the chicken. You can blend the chicken sauce, then the tomatillo salsa, then the chile rojo salsa in the same blender without washing if you do it in that order (light to dark). This saves time on dishes and baking. Make the tamale dough (one batch per filling). Make hot chocolate if you like.
Day 2: To eat at 7pm…
Noon: make guacamole; remove dough and fillings from fridge so they can come to room temperature
2pm: have guests arrive; soak husks; make margaritas
2:30pm teach guests how to make tamales; set out spoons, husks and twine and dig into full on Tamale Assembly
4pm: put water on to boil; load steamers. Prep the roasted chayotes.
5:30pm: Start roasting the chayotes; set out the salsas to come to room temperature.
6pm: Check the tamales. If the dough isn’t solid, keep steaming.
6:30pm turn off oven, but leave the chayotes inside.
7pm: serve the chayotes, tamales, salsas.
30 minutes before you want to serve dessert, make the hot chocolate or rewarm if you made it ahead.
- Chili Lime Chicken Filling
- Bean and Butternut Squash Filling
- Mushroom Kale Filling
- Tamale Dough
- Dried Corn Husks (30 per filling plus lots of extra)
- Soak the husks in water for at least 30 minutes (I often put them in water up to 2 hours ahead of time). Drain well. Select 30 of the largest husks without tears or large holes.
- Arrange one husk on a work surface with the narrow end pointing away from you. On the wide end, spread 3 tablespoons of the tamale dough in a 5-by-3-inch rectangle, leaving a ½ inch border of husk at the bottom.
- Spoon 2 tablespoons of the cooled filling in the center of the Tamale Dough.
It's really important to be fairly accurate in the filling and dough. I have my guests measure the first couple they make. If you make them too big, they will take a VERY long time to steam. - Fold in the long sides of the husk, overlapping them to enclose the filling.
- Fold the bottom up. The goal is that you have dough completely covering the filling, which is in a little pocket in the center.
- Roll all the way up.
- Tie off with kitchen twine or strands of husk you can tear off of the rejected husks.
- I sort them into piles so I can try to keep track of the flavors, but invariably they’ll get mixed up if you're not super careful. You could also color code with twine.
- Repeat with the remaining corn husks, tamale dough and filling.
- If you made all three kinds, you’ll need a huge steamer. I use my multi-purpose 12-quart stock pot and steamer insert. Fill the bottom of the steamer with water to keep the level below the insert and bring to a boil.
- Load the steamer with tamales. The steam with get through, so you can really load it up. I use both baskets.
- Add the tamales, spread some of the remaining corn husks over the top and cover with the lid. Set the timer for 10 minutes and check the water level. Once you know how quickly your water evaporates, you can set the timer to refill according to that. For me, it was about every 25 minutes. This is important because you don’t want to destroy your pot by boiling without water.
- Steam the tamales over moderately low heat for 90-120 minutes.
- Open one tamale and check to see that the dough is firm. If it is, then the tamales are ready. Uncover the pot and let cool for 15 minutes before serving.
- Serve with the salsas and a large bowl on the table for the husks.
