Tamale time

This year, we did not travel back to California for the Christmas break. We spent 2 blissful weeks, just hanging out at home, going to the movies, and cooking tons of delicious things to eat.  It is a Christmas tradition that we eat tamales. Normally, we are back in California, and we are treated to unlimited tamales hand made by my in-laws. But no longer being in our home state, we had to make our own this year.

Tamales are delicious, but require a lot of ingredients and labor. The first thing we had to do was go out and gather our ingredients. We don't have a large Mexican population here, so that makes it a bit of a challenge. But there is one particular grocery store that does stock up on Mexican ingredients. And it's only about 20 minutes away. How can you tell when a grocery store will have a large selection of Mexican ingredients? It will most likely contain 2 things. A fresh tortillaria , and an aisle of these babies. 

Since when did they start selling Lottery candles? They didn't have these when I was a kid. 

Lottery candle, anyone?

Every time we walk into this store, it immediately brings back pleasant memories of home. The sights, the smells, the abundance of delicious items that are familiar to us, yet hard to find here. It really does have every item on our tamale shopping list. Check out the spices and chile's. Yes, we need those.

You are going to need spices

and chiles.

Speaking of ingredients, here is what you will need to make about 5 dozen tamales.

To form the tamales, you will need the following ingredients:

• 1 bag of dried corn husks.

For the pork filling:

• 3 lbs of boneless or 5 lb bone in pork butt, with as little fat as possible.
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1/2 onion
• 3 tbsp salt

For chili sauce:

• 3oz bag of California chiles
• 3 or 4 Guajillo chiles
• 3 or 4 chili negro or chili ancho, whichever you can find
• 6 gloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp oregano
• 1 1/2 tbsp Siete Azahares or Especial Mixtas Pickling
• 4tbps Caldo de Pollo seasoning

For the masa:

• 1 bag of Maseca Tamal masa mix, or fresh masa, whichever you can find. If you buy the masa mix, make sure it is for tamales, and not tortillas.
• One bag of tamale masa (it needs to be tamale masa, not tortilla masa)about 2/3 cup of lard 
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 cups of pork broth made from cooking the pork
• 1/2 tsp salt

As I said earlier, tamales are labor intensive. You can make them alone, but it's easier with some help. This year, poor Alex pretty much made them on his own. I had been ill earlier in the week, and this pushed back my baking schedule. So I did my baking Christmas Eve morning, then had to go to work for a couple of hours. This left the tamale making to the men of the house.

You can expect this to take up most of your day. So it really is easier to have help.  I will break the steps up into sections. But before I do, let's set some ground rules. Making tamales can be a messy job. The chili sauce stains, you get masa on your hands, etc. You should either wear an apron, or clothes that you don't mind getting dirty. The next thing that you need to keep in mind is that you will be using plenty of pots, bowls, spoons, strainers, measuring cups, etc. You will be using a lot of kitchen equipment. Your counters are going to be covered with various things. We do try to wash and get things off the counter to keep it tidy, but it's almost impossible to do. There is just too much going on. So just be prepared for a messy looking kitchen. Just keep wiping down the counters, and moving empty kitchen gear into the sink. Ok, on to the steps to making tamales.

The corn husks:

The night before you plan on making the tamales, get out your bag of dried corn husks and soak them in a big container of some sort. We usually use a large cooler. Make sure that the corn husks are completely submerged. This will help to make the corn husks soft and pliable when you start to form the tamales the next day. So let them soak over night. The next day, go ahead and dump the water and leave the corn husks in the container while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.

The pork:

Take your pork butt, removing as much fat as possible. Cut it up into chunks,

and place it into a large pot filled with water. Add 1/2 onion (not diced), 4 cloves of garlic, and let the water boil. Once boiled, add 3 tbsp salt. Cover and let the meat cook for 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Then pull pork out and save the broth. You will use the broth later. 

Cooked pork, ready to be shredded.

The broth. Save this for later!

Once the pork is cooked and out of the pot, go ahead and shred it with your hands. 

Chile sauce:

Take all of the Calfornia chiles, 3 or 4 guajillo chiles, 3 or 4 negro or ancho chiles, into a large pot. Fill the pot with water until the chiles are covered. Boil until the chiles feel tender.

Chiles are chillin' in the pot.

Once tender, pull them out and pat them to get rid of any steam. You can throw out the water from the pot.

Gently pat down the chiles to remove steam.

Place the chiles into a blender, add 1/2 to 3/4 cups of the pork broth, 6 cloves of garlic, 1 tbps oregano, 1 1/2 tbsp Siete Azahares or Espcial Mixtas Pickling, 4 tbsp Caldo de Pollo seasoning. Blend it all together very well.

Blending the chiles.

You will need to have a fine strainer. Pour the chili sauce through the strainer to remove any chunks of chili. Set your chili sauce aside.

Take another pot, add a bit of olive oil, and heat up, as you put shredded pork and add chili sauce. Mix in the chili sauce a little at a time. You do not want it too wet. Mix well and remove from flame once it is heated. 

Masa:

This is the best masa mix we have used. Try to find this brand, if you can. And remember that it has to be specifically for tamales, not tortillas.

Take 2 cups of the Masa Tamal mix,1 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp salt, and mix together. Then take  2 cups of the of the pork broth,  and pour it into the masa mixture. Mix well with your hands. In another bowl, take the 2/3 cup of lard and beat it until it is soft. Then  add your masa mixture and continue to beat until the batter is smooth and slightly sticky.

Mixin' the masa. In case you haven't noticed, making tamales is very hands on.

While we are on the subject of tamales being hands on, let me warn you that your clothes can get messy. Either wear an apron that covers you well, or wear clothes that you don't care about.Ok, you are finally ready to set up your assembly line. You will need a corn husk station, masa station, pork station, and a large  cake pan to place them on once assembled. The cake pan will let you place the tamales standing up, rather than lay them flat.

Take a corn husk and open it up onto the palm of your hand. Use a spoon to place the masa mix and smear it all over the corn husk. You don't want to little or too much masa. You can use a spoon, butter knife or your hands to spread the masa. Oh that is another thing. Because you are using your hands so much, you are washing them like crazy. Have plenty of hand towels or paper towels available to dry your hands.

Noah's first tamal of the season. It's a tradition to take a picture.

Nik making his first tamal of the season. And what did I say about the counters? Overflowing with stuff. Just accept it and move on to the next tamale.

 Next, move over to your meat station. Spoon on a good amount of pork. Again, you don't want too little or too much pork.

Noah loading up the tamale.

Once you have your pork on, take the 2 sides of the tamale and roll them together, and finally fold up the bottom portion.

Here are the assembled tamales. OMG, what a mess. Anyway, just focus on the tamales and cute kids.

 Place the assembled tamale into the cake pan, and move on to your next tamale. You will continue to do this until you assemble every last tamale, or die of exhaustion. Whichever comes first.

Gut check time. Keep building those tamales!

Once every tamale is assembled, take a large tamale steamer (with just a little bit of water at the bottom) and start to place them standing up inside. You kind of lean them standing up in a circle.

Keep doing that until you have all of your tamales in the pot. Then place the large steamer onto the stove and let them steam away on medium heat. Once the windows to the kitchen start to steam up, we know they are close to ready. But the best way to tell, is to take a tamale out and taste it. If the masa is somewhat firm, then you know they are ready. 

Phew, that is a lot of work, but so worth it!

 
And they are ready to eat!

Thumbs up, Noah!

See next blog post for ideas to use the left over chili sauce.

Battle of the nerd box subscriptions

For the past few months, the kids have been receiving a monthly subscriptions box, called Loot Crate. For $13.37 a month, plus s & h, you get a box filled with all things nerd. They have loved every box so far, and it has been worth the money. With 2 kids, I pay for 2 boxes, and they get the same items each month. If you are interested in subscribing, click on the link.

https://www.lootcrate.com/

This month, I decided to try out an additional nerd subscription for the boys. This one is called Nerd Block. https://www.nerdblock.com/ They have several different boxes to choose from. I ordered two classic nerd boxes for the first try. The classic boxes are $19.99 each, plus s & h. They are slightly more expensive than Loot Crate.

Here is a comparison of the December Loot Crate and Nerd Block Classic boxes. 

First up, Nerd Block. Two kids, means 2 boxes. 

Each box received:

• an autographed picture of Val Kilmer. Apparently, some received Warwick Davis autographs. 
• Gizmo plush toys. Pretty cute!
• Kreo-O Dungeons & Dragons figure. You can't go wrong with Kre-O.
• Tetris Notebook. These were pretty cool. Definitely something that you would keep on your desk.  
• 2 different shirts. The shirt was supposed to be a Harry Potter Butter Beer shirt in either maroon or black. Both boys received the maroon. They were good quality. The 2nd shirt was a surprise bonus. Nik received a Japanese anime shirt. Sorry, I don't recognize the character, but it was an angry dog. Noah's bonus shirt was of Adventure Time. The bonus shirts were both nice, and a very pleasant surprise.

The boys really loved their Nerd Block boxes, so I will keeping the subscriptions going. This month, the value of the box definitely exceeded the $19.99 price tag.

Next up, the December Loot Crate. The boys received identical items in their boxes. They included the following:

• A Captain America Air-Freshner in vanilla scent. The kids loved these and immediately hung them in their room, so it's not in the picture below. 
• I Am Groot socks. Another big hit with the kids. But Nik's socks had little holes on each sock. I was able to stitch them up and he will still wear them. But the quality of the socks was not great. 
• Tetris sticker set. They were a package up puffy stickers in the Tetris design. 
• GhostBusters door hanger. Another thing that was a hit and immediately went into the kids rooms before I could take a picture. 
• Simpsons wallet. It's lightwieght, and the package says that it is durable and water-proof. It kind of feels like paper. But it really does seem like a durable wallet.
• Exclusive to Loot Crate Joker as Batman POP. Pretty cool!
• Exclusive Batman Comic Book issue 36. The cover is supposed to be exclusive to Loot Crate. 

I was surprised at the lack of t shirt, since they had been receiving shirts for the past few months. But even without the shirt, the box was a great value. 

It's hard to compare and say which monthly subscription is better. The kids liked the shirts and Gremlin from Nerd Block, but loved the socks, comic,and Pop from Loot Crate. So they say subscribe to both boxes!

Hanging out with dinosaurs

Walking with Dinosaurs Live made a stop in town over the weekend. As luck would have it, Travel Zoo had a great discount on tickets. If you have never checked out the travel zoo website, I highly recommend it. We have been able to find some good deals on anything from hotels to theater tickets. http://www.travelzoo.com/ I was able to score 4 tickets for less than $100. What frustrates me on any of these live performances, are all of the ticket fees that get added on. The tickets were $16 each, but after this fee and that fee, they ended up totally about $24 each.

Let me start by saying that we tried to see this show the last time they were in town. That was in 2008, right after we moved here. Noah was pretty much home bound. His anxiety was severe enough that it prevented us from doing very much. But we always tried. We took the kids to the show back then, hoping that the appeal of the dinosaurs would keep Noah in his seat. No chance. He bolted almost immediately, so one parent sat with Nik, while the other parent sat with Noah in the lobby of Sprint Center.

So flash forward to this weekend, we decided to give it a try. Noah seemed a little apprehensive. The day of the show, he talked about being scared when he was little. We reminded him that those days were behind him, but that we would pack his headphones just in case.

The tickets were the least expensive seats, so I was fully prepared to be in nose bleed territory. But they were actually good seats. We were 21 rows back from the stage.

And Noah seemed pretty calm. Maybe the popcorn and cotton candy had something to do with that.

If you are familiar with the Walking with Dinosaurs tv series from BBC, you know that it took you right into the world of dinosaurs, along with paleontologist Nigel.  Well for the live show, we didn't get Nigel. We got some other dude. I forgot his name. But the show did a great job explaining what life would have been like.

Dinosaur and dude not named Nigel.

Of course, there were lots of opportunities to see what happens when herbivore meets carnivore. 

And volcano eruptions.

The show took us through the 3 ages of dinosaurs; Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous. Some of the dinosaurs were small, and I could tell that there was a person inside. The larger ones were controlled by people and remote control. They were quite big.

  

A flying pterosaur even made an appearance.

And of course, the vicious velociraptor. 

And for the finale, T Rex made an appearance.

Mama T Rex came in to rescue her baby.

We all really enjoyed the show. And I loved that Noah could verbalize and be proud of the fact that this was something he could not do a few years ago. Way to go, Noah! We really cheer on these moments. Never let these moments pass, without acknowledging the struggles to get there. It makes these days that much more sweet. 

It's beauty box time!

I recently subscribed to a monthly beauty box service. For $12 a month, Beauty Box five will ship you a small box filled with five different beauty care items. Who doesn't like getting new make-up to try out?  Each box contained at least a couple items that I really liked. And it also had at least one item that I wouldn't have normally tried, but still liked.

Here is what I received in my September beauty box. The theme was called Balancing Act.

1 Eyelight crayon, 2 packs of deep conditioner and co-wash, toe spacers (to apply nail polish), 1 nail polish, and 1 mascara.

First, the mascara. Revlon Bold Lacquer length and volume mascara in black. Retail value is $7.99, but I have seen it at Target for cheaper than that. It has a nice, long brush. I have been using it for a month. It doesn't clump of flake. While it lengthens my lashes,  it doesn't really make them look thick enough. I like thick lashes, since I wear glasses all day. So I have been applying a top coat of mascara made by Too Faced. Perfect!

This is the Nicka K New York Eyelight crayon. Retail value is $4.49. I don't know how this would look as an eyeliner. But I used it today to make a smokey eye look. I just applied it over eyeliner, and smudged it a bit with one of my eyeshadow brushes. I will definitely use this again.

And the nail polish, by My Beauty Spot, retail value of $24.99. I don't know anyone who would pay that much for nail polish. I have never heard, or seen this nail polish in the store. But I would never pay that price for it. I have no idea what the color is, but it is very pretty. It's a nice, thick formula, so it's easy to apply. But it has a very strong odor. 

Final comments for the September box: I definitely got my $12 worth. The eyeliner and mascara alone made it worth the price.

Now on to October's box.

The theme for this month was Effortless Allure

1 chapstick, 1 lip stain, 1 cosmetic tool, 1 nail polish, and yet another mascara.

Ok, so they gave the same mascara in the October box. The. Same. Mascara. That bothers me. I don't mind getting another mascara, but I wish it was a different brand. 

This is the lip and cheek stain. I tested it on my hand, but it's a bit faint. It's just a nice, delicate pink. I applied it to my lips. It's a nice, creamy lip stain. It doesn't have any odor or flavor. Retail value is $19.99, but I have seen it for around $9. 

I also tested out the nail polish. You can see the color on the card above. Nanacoco in Mermaid Lake, retail value is $3.95. The color is very pretty. And it didn't have the weird scent that the September polish had. 

The Chapstick was retailed at $2.99. I've never seen this particular Chapstick before. It has 2 sides. The light blue cap contains a moisturizing lip balm. The other side contains a renewing lip balm. According to the package, the renewing side will "revitalize lips". I tried it, since my lips are chapped. It does what it's supposed to. 

The last item was something called an Extend Your Beauty tool. It's like a tiny little spatula, and is meant to be used in tubes and bottles where you only have a bit of product remaining. You use the spatula to get the last bit of product out of the bottle.  Retail value is $5.49. I have never seen it in a store before, but it seems like a handy little tool. 

Over all, I would say that I got my money's worth in the October box. The items would definitely have been more than $12 in the store. I will definitely use the polish, lip stain, and lip balm. And eventually, I will use the other mascara. Again. I hope November's box does not include the same mascara. But I am excited to see what is in the box this month.

Interested in subscribing? Here's a link. 

http://www.beautybox5.com/?u=19681