Crockpot tamales, a must have recipe

Recently Richie and I tried a new recipe for our New Year's Eve dinner. It was a tradition in my family growing up to buy tamales for our dinner on New Year's Eve. I always loved and looked forward to that meal every year. I had always wanted to make tamales but heard how much time they took so I had always been a bit hesitant. Then I came across this recipe that told how you could could make tamales in the crock pot. Ah ha, crock pot! Now we're talking. I love using my crock pot and anytime I can find a good recipe using it I get excited. Anyhow without further ado here is the recipe and some pictures of the final product. This is a wonderful recipe and I would definitely make them again for my family. The only thing is you do have to plan ahead as they do take some time but are well worth it!!

Filling:
1 (3.5-pound) store-bought rotisserie chicken or 3-4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

1 tsp cumin

1/2 yellow onion

diced 1 clove garlic

minced 1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 (4-ounce) can chopped green chilies, mild

1 (15-ounce) can corn, drained

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Tamale Dough:
4 cups masa harina

2 1/2 cups beef broth

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp kosher salt

1 1/3 cup lard or vegetable shortening (I used Crisco)

1 (6-ounce) package dried corn husks (I needed to go to a Mexican grocer)

The Directions:
There are a few parts here. I "cheated" and used a fully-cooked chicken as the meat in my tamale filling. If you'd like, you can cook a hunk of beef or pork overnight with spices and chili pods in your crock pot. The meat should shred easily with forks before it is ready to go inside the tamales.

If you're going to use the rotisserie chicken, combine the meat with the onion, garlic, can of green chilies, cumin, salt, and drained corn in a 4 quart (or so) crock pot and cook on high for 3-4 hours, or on low for 6. The onions need to be translucent before going into the tamales. If you don't have time for this step, skip the garlic and onion, and combine the chicken with the chilies, cumin, salt, and drained corn in a mixing bowl. Set aside.

Soften the corn husks by soaking them in very hot water until they are quite pliable.

To make the masa, combine all dough ingredients in a large mixing bowl, and beat on medium-to-high speed until everything is mixed well and the dough is spongy. Check the dough by dropping a little ball of it into a glass of water. It should float. If it doesn't float, this source says to continue to beat the dough. This particular step totally did not work for me. It was very frustrating and discouraging. My dough never did float completely. My dough was well mixed and the tamales did come out perfect! So just be careful on this step!

Take a bit larger than a golf-ball size piece of masa dough, and spread it into a wet corn husk. The dough should be about 1/4 inch thick--you do not want to see the corn husk through the dough. Add a bit of filling, and some cheese. Fold the corn husk over to join the edges of the masa. If you need to add more dough, do so---no filling should peek through. Fold all corn husk edges into the center and place into the bottom of an empty crock pot, seam side down (I used a 6.5 quart, and fit 19 inside).

Repeat. Many, many, many times. It took me about 2 hours to make all of the tamales. If you find that your corn husks are unraveling, you can add another the other way to secure it, and tear off a long piece to tie around. I had to do this a few times. I also needed to add more hot water to the soaking husks to keep them pliable. If you need to step away from the tamale-making-process for a bit, put the lid on your crock pot to keep moisture inside.

When the crock pot is full, put the lid on and cook on high for 4-6 hours, or until a tester tamale looks and tastes done. The tamales on the edges will cook a bit faster. Once your tester looks good (I used the same one, and kept re-wrapping it and adding it back when it wasn't ready), unplug the crock pot and keep the lid off. Don't unwrap any others until they've set for about 15 minutes. My tamales were cooked at 6 hours, but I began checking every 45 minutes at 4 hours.

The Verdict:
I was thrilled that these worked so well! They are definitely labor-intensive, but pack such an impressive presentation. Now that I know how to do them, I'll make them again----but not for a while.

Even our little dogs enjoyed the smell of these tamales and when it came time to dish them up on our plates they about went crazy! And yes I saved a bite of tamale for them once we were done, soooo spoiled!!

I hope you get a chance to try this recipe. My family certainly enjoyed it!