Posted
on March 23, 2016
Tamales
are delicious. Made of masa (corn-based dough) filled with meats,
cheeses, vegetables, even fruits, tamales are wrapped in a corn husk
or a banana leaf before they are steamed. This wrapping is, of
course, discarded before the tamales are eaten.
Did
I say eaten? I meant devoured, savored, enjoyed!
Making
tamales is time-consuming and challenging enough that some families
have special get-together to make them before a holiday meal. Of
course, other families buy their tamales from their favorite “Tamale
Guy,” “Tamale Factory,” or other source. I've seen signs for
“homemade tamales” in unlikely places like a hair salon!
One
of my favorite meals is Trader Joe's “Cheese and Green Chile
Tamales.”
This
is the first year that March 23 is celebrated as National
Tamale Day, and there was a logo contest whose winners will be
announced today. Check out the official website.
Apparently there are lots of Tamale Days celebrated all through the
year in particular towns in the U.S. – but today is the start of
the nationwide celebration of this food.
Where'd
it come from...?
The
yummy and varied tamale is a traditional Mesoamerican dish.
“Mesoamerican” means Middle-American—in other words, Central
American. People often associate the dish with Mexicans, which is
fine—but the dish has been around since around 8000 BCE, and Mexico
became a country almost ten thousand years later!
Aztec
and Maya made versions of tamales, and so did the Olmecs and Toltecs
before them. This portable food was used for hunters, traders,
armies, and travelers.
By
the way, because so many different groups made tamales, there are a
lot of different names for this dish, many of which are still in use.
The word tamales is Spanish, but the singular form of the
Spanish word is tamal.
English
speakers hearing tamales, plural, assumed that the singular
was tamale, so that has indeed become the “proper”
singular form in English. This formation of a word is called
back-formation.
- Here is a video that shows a “simple” way of making tamales. You can see why I mention that it is time-consuming!
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