Kids love working with their hands, which makes tamales–mixing the dough, wrapping it in corn husks–the perfect assignment for our “food appreciation” classes. This week on our virtual world culinary tour we are in Puebla, a city south of Mexico City known for its colorful ceramics and its clever chefs. But really, tamales are almost [...]
Midway into my tamales project I decided to follow my wife’s advice and bone up a little more on how to make tamales. Up to this point, I had made two critical errors. The first was assuming I could buy a book about tamales and rely on it exclusively. The recipe I chose turned out [...]
After yesterday’s comedy of stuffing too much masa into the mixing bowl, we collected ourselves and set about the task of actually making some tamales. My wife joined me for a consult as I tried to decide on the best method for spreading the dough on the corn husks and folding the husks into neat [...]
Tags: mis en place·tamales
We are engaging the concerns of a hungry planet--slowly--right here in our kitchen garden in the District of Columbia, about a mile from the White House.
What's in your turkey? We killed and butchered more than 80 birds on the farm of Mike and Michelle Klein in Prince George's County. Thankfully, Michelle did the gutting. Unfortunately, Mike bought his turkey chicks earlier than usual and they did not stop growing. Our prize for helping was a carcass that weighed nearly 40 pounds. It barely fit in the oven. Here, Mike is subjecting a slaughtered bird to the "magic fingers," a machine with a nubby, rotating barrel that removes most of the feathers. 
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