Vegetarian Tamales made easy

Diets are widely varied and it is fun getting to know various recipes and dishes to try. Alternatives are created within our own culture to honour certain ideals or because there is a physiological need for them. With this in mind, I wanted to find a suitable recipe for February 2nd, as at least here in Mexico, on the feast of Candlemas, many Mexican families will be preparing one of the most famous dishes in the country: Tamales.

Tamales are prepared with corn dough to which they can add different amounts of fillers and flavours and then they are wrapped in corn husks or banana leaves and steamed. Tamales is a dish that has existed on the continent since before the arrival of Europeans, and while it certainly differs greatly from the ingredients and preparation methods that were used in the past, today we can find items such as pork, chicken, milk and other products in Asia and Europe to incorporate into Tamales them which were not available to the Mesoamerican in ancient times. Today I am going to provide a few vegetarian alternatives, which do not use items such as pig lard (used in almost all tamales recipes) and only use filling that you would find in the plant kingdom. I hope you like my selection of recipes. Don't forget to leave your questions or ideas about these dishes in the comments section.

Tamales stuffed with stewed mushrooms

Ingredients:

• 1kg Corn dough
• 200 ml Vegetable oil
• 400 g sliced mushrooms
• 200 g sweet corn
• 4 Tomatoes
• ½ an onion (chopped)
• 1 clove of garlic
• 500 g dried corn leaves
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Olive oil

Preparation:

1. Sautee the onion and garlic in a skillet with a little olive oil. Once they are browned, add the mushrooms and tomatoes and cook until smooth.

2. Soak in water to soften and clean the corn leaves.

3. Mix the vegetable oil with the corn dough to form a dough that pulls away easily from the hands.

4. Portioning the corn dough on the leaves, placing two generous tablespoons of the dough and spreading it on the leaf (so that when rolled the dough tamale will wrap around the filling), add the stewed mushrooms and sweetcorn on top.

5. To wrap, try to imagine the corn leaf as a triangle: The filling should be placed in the middle, between the tip and the base, then the triangle is wound and the base is pulled to the end to finally tie the tamal (you can use thread, although traditionally it is tied with small leaves or small pieces of tamal leaves). At the end you will hopefully have something resembling a small package.

6. Cook in a steamer for about 1 hour or until the tamales are cooked, the corn leaf should easily peal from the bread dough.

Sweet banana leaf Tamales with cranberries and raisins

Ingredients:

• 12 ears of corn
• 200 g margerine
• 200 g raisins
• 200 g of dehydrated cranberries
• 1 ½ cup of sugar
• 1 tsp. of salt
• 500 g of banana leaves

Preparation:

1. Slice the ears of corn horizontally, and grind the resulting pieces with a processor.

2. Stir in the cranberries, raisins, sugar and salt into the corn paste until you have a more or less homogeneous mixture.

3. Soak the banana leaves in water to clean and soften them.

4. Split the dough among the banana leaves, roughly 40g of douch per tamal (You can add more or less depending on the size of tamales you want), wrap and tie both ends of the leaf as if it were candy.

5. Cook in a steamer for about 1 hour or until the tamales are cooked, the corn leaf should peel away easily from the bread.

Black bean-stuffed Tamales

Ingredients:

• 1 kg of Corn dough
• 200 ml vegetable oil
• 300 g of cooked black beans (or other beans should you not be able to obtain this variety)
• 4 Morita chillies
• 500 g of dried corn leaves
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Additional vegetable oil

Preparation:

1. heat the beans and morita chilies in a pan with a little vegetable oil and grind them to a paste.

2. Soak the corn leaves in water to soften and clean them.

3. Mix the vegetable oil with the corn dough to form a dough that pulls away easily from the hands.

4. Split the corn dough between the leaves, placing two generous tablespoons of the dough and spreading it on the leaf. Place the bean paste on top then wrap and close up.

5. Cook in a steamer for about 1 hour or until the tamales are cooked, the corn leaves should peel easily from the bread.

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