Today is February 2nd, which means it is Tamale Night, at least here in Colima State. Let me explain. On January 6th, it is Three Kings Day – the day of the 3 Magi who visited Baby Jesus. On this day it is customary to eat the Rosca, a wreath-shaped pastry that has a plastic baby Jesus cooked inside. Whoever gets the piece with the Baby Jesus is supposed to provide tamales on February 2nd. When I was visiting the family of a friend in Mexico City years ago, I was told that whoever got that piece was supposed to throw a party, so I don’t know if the customs vary slightly in different parts of Mexico.
So, anyway, this year Lourdes’ 4-year-old grandson got the piece, but obviously he was not going to cook tamales. I asked Lourdes if she was going to cook them, but she decided to have other people provide them.
Now, there are several different type of tamales, all prepared within the corn husk. There are tamales de ceniza (ash tamales) prepared in singed husks, tamales de carne (meat) and tamales de elote (corn). We walked through the village to the woman who was preparing the corn tamales, and she delivered them to the Casita.
Once we arrived at the Casita, I had my usual cappuccino along with the corn tamale. It is close to Valentine’s Day, so there are decorations of hearts, etc., everywhere and the very artistic Nadia decorated my cappuccino with hearts and little silver edibles.
Nadia’s artwork
plain tamale of mashed corn
After a while, Lourdes’ friends arrived from Tecoman with a bucket of different ones. I decided to try the tamales de ceniza first. I have learned to ask about any food when it is my first time to try it – Está enchiloso? Tiene chiles? Is it spicy? Does it have chilies? The answer was, no it was not spicy. So I tried it – and it was a bit spicy. From experience I have learned that “not too spicy” for Mexicans is very spicy for me.
Lourdes holding tamale de ceniza
inside the tamale de ceniza
So now I moved on to the tamale de carne. Not spicy at all and very tasty. The meat in this one, I believe, was pork.
tamale de carne
So after an evening of good food and good conversation, I headed home and am off to sleep now. There will be a few posts over the next few days, as I finally (with much help, thank you, Juanis) am now able to access my photos and place them in my posts.
And so, good night one and all and see you tomorrow!
bucket of tamales
from Tecoman
mex-pat.org 