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Family Recipe - Hot Tamales

Gretchen (9/7/03): Nancy came up with this idea many years ago when we discussed what we would make to go along with the oyster stew. Since we had moved to Alaska, we couldn't go to Grandma Dalzen's anymore for Christmas Eve. Her idea was that we would retain a little of the "Mexican" type of food that was common in Arizona. She remembered some friends of ours bringing tamales to us at Christmas time.

     I actually went down to a bookstore and searched for a recipe, wrote in down out of the cookbook and went home to experiment. I guess I was too cheap to buy the book! It has taken some practice but most of the family can put together a tamale pretty well. We have expanded on the idea and now put together extras such as cheese sauce, sour cream and other toppings. There is always extra tamale meat, so we make sure there are tortillas for meat burritos also.