Tamales - Mark's favorite vegetable!

Getting to know your significant other's family is always an interesting experience, right?

 Mark and I started dating right after Thanksgiving 13 years ago and the first night I met his parents was when Mark invited me over to do the advent wreath with them on a Sunday night. I think it was 3 days after our first official date. I of course started to sweat bullets not only at the prospect of meeting his family for the first time but because I was supposed to know what an advent wreath was. Needless to say, nowhere in my Catholic upbringing did we cover this.

Mark picked me up and drove me way out into the country to his parent's house. His mom met us at the door and gave me a huge hug after we were introduced. I liked her immeidately. Then I had to meet Mark's dad - instantly liked that guy too! Next up were Bill, Mark's brother and Molly - Bill's girlfriend at the time (now his wife). After visiting for a few minutes everyone started to sit down on the floor in a circle around a wreath that had candles placed in it. A bit awkwardly I followed suit - when in Rome, right?

Mark's dad led the discussion about what each candle had stood for in the previous lessons. I still remember. They were studying the four gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and how each one depicted Jesus in their writing. In one He was a prophet, another he was our Savior, and that night's lesson was how Jesus was a man like us. I soaked it up and thought this was the coolest tradition ever. I wasn't even a Christian at the time - that came later after Mark told me I was going to Hell. (A romantic moment if there ever was one.)

Anyway, after the lesson, Mark's family started to break out in songs. Christmas songs. I whispered them as I sang because I didn't want my singing voice to be a deal breaker for Mark and I, plus I hoped to be invited back for next week's lesson. As our night ended and Mark drove me home, I asked him if I had done ok. He said everyone had loved me and not to worry - they all knew it was my first time doing this. "How could everyone know? I acted like I knew exactly what I was doing!" Mark replied "your sweaty hands gave you away when we all prayed after the lesson". Darn it anyway.

I invited Mark over to my house shortly after that and we played a game of Scategories with my mom, my dad and my grandma. My family had just finished making our annual Christmas tamales and I had mentioned to Mark that he could try some later that day. As we were playing Mark rolled the letter T and everyone quickly filled out their categories with words that began with that letter. When the timer went off, we all started to go through our lists one at a time to see what everyone had written down and to record points. We got to the word vegetable and debated whether or not my mom's answer of tomato counted (no it did not) and then it was Mark's turn to share his answer. "Tamales!" he shouted out triumphantly, proud as all get out. No one else had written that down, of course. My grandma and parents just looked at him to see if he was kidding, then they looked at me. I started laughing and through my hiccups I explained to Mark exactly what a tamale was. My family still teases him to this day about tamales being a vegetable.

Well, that was a long way to get to today's post - tamales! Yesterday was the day my family got together to make tamales and I took a few pictures just to make sure that none of you think it's a vegetable either. My family has made tamales every year since before I was born. It's a lot of work (mainly for my grandma) but it's a lot of fun too. All the women of the family and sometimes the men (Mark and my Dad mainly) sit around my grandma's tiny table in her tiny dining room and talk, laugh and tease while we make tamales.

Grandma will have spent the morning slaving away in the kitchen preparing the masa, the meat and the corn husks which are called hojas (OH - has). This takes a long time and it is the reason grandma doesn't usually have to prepare any tamales. She just gets to sit and hold any babies that are available or play with the grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

On the table you will find lots of containers with these ingredients in them.

                             
   Everyone gets a plate, cutting board or something to create their tamales on. Then we get paper towels (tamales are messy) and start by getting some hojas and wiping the water off them. They have been soaked so that they are soft and ready to cook. You dry them off and you sometimes have to put two hojas together to create a big enough surface for your masa.

Once your hojas are prepared you use a spatula or spoon to spread the masa onto them. My first one I did backwards - Oops! You are supposed to spread the masa towards the large end and leave the pointy end masa free because that is the side that folds up.

Make sure the masa isn't too thin and make sure it isn't too thick and then you are ready for the meat. This has always been a bone of contention in my family. My grandma runs around yelling "You are putting in too much meat!" while the rest of us try to secretly put in more.

Once the meat is in, then you can add an olive if you want. I know some families add different things like pineapples or mushrooms but my family adds an olive.

All you have to do after that is fold up the pointy end and wrap it up like a burrito. Then my grandma cooks them in a steamer for just about forever or at least it seems like forever before they are done. We fill container after container of tamales and it can sometimes take two days to cook them all. It takes us hours just to assemble them all.

This year we had quite the distraction. What's better than one sweet new baby in the family?

Two!

These are my cousin Aubrey's sweet little twin babies and I think tamale making took a little longer this year because all the women of the family just wanted to hold them and play with them.

This is Camyron and she is already quite the diva. A mommy's girl completely she just liked to look around and take in all the noise.

This little man is Carson and I don't know if it's because I have two little boys or what but I have decided I am partial to baby boys. They are always happy and smiley and so darn cute. I talked with Carson and held him and fed him and even let him spit up all over me. He had that breathless way of cooing at you that just about had me in tears. I took a picture of him with my camera phone and sent Mark a message asking if I could have one for Christmas and he just laughed at me in reply. Isn't he cute? (The baby of course, not Mark. Well he's cute too but you know what I mean!)

Here he is before the camera goes off:

And here he is after! That flash will get you everytime!

Sigh. I LOVE babies!