By Mark Hasty
For the life of me, I can’t understand why tamales have never gone mainstream in this country. Sure, they’re popular enough, but given our love for Mexican food and our current passion for street grub, they ought to be even more popular than they are. They’re comforting, with soft spongy masa dough giving way to a filling as spicy — or not spicy — as you want. They’re usually small, meaning a tamale or two can be a pleasant small indulgence. That leads to one of the best thing about tamales: They’re scalable. One or two tamales for a light snack, three or more for a meal as substantial as you want it to be.
Tamales aren’t difficult to make but they’re labor intensive which probably explains why they’ve never quite gone mainstream. Most of us don’t have the giant chunks of time it takes to crank out tamales. So we get them as part of combo plate #5, if we get them at all.
The Texas Tamale Company is trying to change that. They’ve begun selling frozen tamales in grocery stores and online. SportsandFood.com was given the opportunity to sample their products.
Texas Tamale Company sells five different varieties of tamales: beef, pork, chicken, black bean and spinach. The company provided us with a dozen of each variety along with a tub of its Homestyle Beef Chili and a tub of its Chili con Queso to pour over the top. The tamales come in packs of twelve, wrapped in heavy plastic but placed in a very nice cloth sack. The company recommends heating the tamales in a steamer but also includes microwave instructions. For the sake of fairness, I tried both methods.
The tamales themselves are just a few ounces of masa dough and filling stuffed inside a dried corn husk. Whether you use a steamer or a microwave they turn out beautifully. Once you unwrap the husk and take a bite you’re treated to the wonderfully soft, spongy masa dough, which was so good I think I’d eat a blank tamale. The meat fillings are all quite finely ground. Beef is the spiciest, though honestly the beef tamales weren’t quite as hot as their vivid orange color led me to expect they would be. The chicken are the mildest but don’t take that to mean they aren’t flavorful. The pork falls in between. All the meat tamales taste strongly of powdered chile and garlic.
I was expecting to like the black bean tamales, and I did. Black beans and corn have a great affinity for one another; the mildly spiced beans were meltingly soft and combined with the corn to create a taste both ancient and contemporary. Of all the tamales I sampled they were my favorite, particularly with Texas Tamale Company’s excellent chili con queso drizzled over the top. The spinach was a tougher sell for me because I really don’t like cooked spinach, but the masa dough seemed to cut the bitterness of the greens. I could see serving them as a vegetable dish at a dinner party.
The chili con queso wasn’t just good on the black bean tamales; it was a nice complement to every flavor and just fine all by itself on tortilla chips. I wondered to myself who would buy chili con queso when it isn’t that hard to make, but Texas Tamale Company’s queso is different from the standard homemade product. I think I’ll be picking up a tub for New Year’s Eve.
Texas Tamale Company bills its chili as “authentic Texas style,” meaning it contains neither beans nor tomatoes. The beef is finely ground, not usually what I associate with chili. As a Northerner I know I’m not allowed to have an opinion on what authentic Texas chili is supposed to taste like. I do feel comfortable in saying that this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. That’s not to say I didn’t like it; in fact, I loved it. I am reasonably familiar with Cincinnati-style chili, however, and TTC’s chili seems to have a similar spice profile. (To be fair, it’s a lot spicier than any Cincinnati chili I’ve ever tasted.) I leave it to actual Texans to determine this chili’s authenticity. It was quite good on the tamales, particularly the beef tamales, but I liked it best by itself. It’s easily the best packaged chili I’ve ever tasted and I am not prepared to admit how many packaged chilis I’ve tried.
Now, let’s be clear: these tamales don’t need a topping to make them taste good. The chili and the queso both enhanced all the tamales but I got good results with picante sauce and taco sauce as well, and they were fine plain too.
I was able to find Texas Tamale Company products in grocery stores here in Wisconsin but can’t tell you what the availability might be in your area. (Because the tamales are gluten-free, your local healthy food store may carry them too.) Retail prices are quite reasonable. If you can find them in your area, stashing a sack or two in your freezer is strongly recommended. You’ll be glad they’re there some day during halftime, some evening when you’re too tired to cook anything, or some midnight when you’ve got the sudden urge for something spicy. If you can’t find them in your area you can order them online directly from the company. The prices seem daunting ($54.75 for two dozen tamales and a pint of chili, for instance) but those prices include the overnight shipping these perishable, frozen products require.
The overnight shipping probably puts these into the “occasional treat” category but they’re well worth the splurge. We approve.
Texas Tamale Company provided us with five dozen tamales, a pint of chili, and a pint of chili con queso for this review. No other consideration was provided.
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