Tag: ecofriendly

Recently, we hosted a tamale luncheon at my school in collaboration with author Florencia Ramirez who wrote the book “Eat Less Water”.

The event planning process was educational, specifically the press release and how to write one portion. Honestly, I wasn’t previously even aware of what a press release was, or that you could just write one and send it to a local news network. The designing an invitation part was okay, but I feel like it wasn’t necessary, as we all pretty much know how to do that and one person could’ve just made a nice one.

The production of the event was a tad chaotic. The cooking of the inner contents with the spice mix went well, and everything was fine and dandy until we got to the masa. Our masa wouldn’t stick to the hojas, which was kind of an issue, but it got resolved. The table design honestly turned out nicer than I expected it to.

Looking back, I’d like to remake the tamales some other time. They turned out really salty, and pretty small. It would be cool to try it again at home and change the spice mix, making it spicier and less salty. I also think the actual food production could’ve been better planned out, versus spending all our time just anticipating the actual event.

Here’s the invite, if you wanna check it out:

And the recipe for our eco-friendly tamales as well:

Ingredients:

1 package corn husks

For the filling:

2 tablespoons organic olive oil

1 medium head of organic garlic

1 large bunch organic swiss chard

1 large bunch organic kale

1 pound organic Monterey Jack cheese

For the masa (corn meal dough):

4½ cups organic/non-GMO Masa Harina (Bob’s Red Mill brand is non-GMO)

3 cups organic vegetable broth

¼ cup organic olive oil

2 teaspoons salt

For the chile sauce:

4 tablespoons organic olive oil

1 teaspoon organic all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon organic powder chile

½ teaspoon organic garlic powder

¼ teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Soak the corn husks in a large bowl/pot of warm water. This also works in the kitchen sink. Always do this step first to give the corn husks enough time to soften. After 45 (or until pliable) minutes take out of the water and pat dry. Water plants with the leftover water.

2. Chop the garlic, kale, and swiss chard. Sauté together in olive oil until the greens are just wilted. Put aside. For the chili sauce, heat olive oil on low flame in a medium pan. Combine remaining ingredients in a small bowl. Add dry ingredients to the oil and mix with a wooden spoon continuously for 2–3 minutes. Remove from flame and add the chard and kale mixture to the chili sauce.

3. Grate cheese and put aside. Monterey Jack is always a good choice for tamales, but experiment with your favorite cheese. Parmigiano-Reggiano mixed in with the Monterey Jack results in a rich buttery flavor.

4. Toast (optional) pine nuts on the stove top in a dry pan. I use a cast iron skillet. Pine nuts toast quickly, in about 3–5 minutes. Stir often until fragrant and golden brown. Transfer pine nuts immediately into a bowl to keep from burning.

5. Combine the ingredients for the masa in a large bowl. The consistency should be like chocolate chip cookie dough. Add more harina or broth as needed.

6. Open a corn husk and place in the palm of one hand. If corn husks are torn you can overlap two. In one hand hold the husk lengthwise and with the other spread 1½ generous tablespoons of masa. You can use anything to spread it; I personally prefer the back of the spoon. Spread the masa in the center area. Leaving about a ¾ to 1 inch margin on the bottom, but you can spread the masa all the way to the top edge. (You will need this 56 margin when folding the husk.) You will quickly learn there is no best way to do this. Every tamalera has his/her own style to spread.

7. Add 1 heaping tablespoon of the sautéed greens, and 2 tablespoons cheese. If you have pine nuts, sprinkle on top of the cheese.

8. Fold the husk around the filling. Wrap the sides first (like you do a burrito) and fold the bottom up. If your husk doesn’t stay closed you can tear thin ribbons of husk to use as ties.

9. Stack tamales upright in an 8-quart steamer with a lid. If you don’t have a steamer, get creative. You can place a steamer basket in a pan, use a canner, or do anything that lifts the tamales above the water. The steaming time varies. A small batch of tamales will take an hour, give or take. I start checking mine before the hour. (An over-steamed tamale is the worst!). Be sure to check your water level in the steamer too. When they look done, remove one tamale with tongs to check if the dough is thoroughly cooked. Just like a cupcake, cooked tamales have no wet dough and the husks will peel off easily.

10. To serve, peel off husk and top with a spoonful of green salsa.

This week a local author named Florencia Ramirez came in and taught us about the importance of water conservation in the kitchen and how we could do it at home in our own kitchen. The following are a few ways we we taught about that can help to conserve water.

1. Buy organic. When chemicals sprayed onto vegetables and the soil, the soil loses its ability to retain water. This means that the food consumes much more water in the growth process.
2. Ideally, avoid animal products. The longer production process, growing the animals food, giving the animal water, land consumption, and water pollution all contribute to the freshwater use of the animal agriculture industry, whether you’re eating meat or any other animal product.
3. Look up what you’re using before you buy it. Some ingredients, even just plant products, use much more water than other crops. If you can use different ingredients in their place, that’s great.

Hopefully that was helpful. In class, we made swiss chard and kale tamales. All the vegetables used were organic, and as little cheese was used as possible. While I still prefer traditional tamales, these were still good and I like the cause behind them.