Honduras' Top Chef

While she may have been guilty of the fish soup incident, Leticia was by far the best cook whose food I've had the pleasure of eating in the 5 months I've been in Honduras.  Practically everything was home-made, from the tortillas to the tamales.  One night, I was lucky to be home when she started a fresh batch of said tamales.  The process itself is fairly simple, but time consuming and labor intensive.

The first step is to shuck corn, a lot of it.  Granted, seeing as she runs a restaurant, we were making tamales for what felt like hundreds of people.  Using a sharp kitchen knife, you then shear all of the kernels off the cob.  This clearly wasn't her first rodeo as she sliced up 4 times the amount I did in the same time, not taking the same regard for her fingers as I was...

Next, you pour the kernels into a hand-turning press and turn the press with your hand.  Seeing as I'm a fairly fit 20-something, I stepped up after a couple minutes to relieve my 60 year old 'mother' of this workout.  Big mistake, it's a lot harder than it looks, but pride wouldn't let me stop until the last kernel was pressed and I was sweating like a pig in the evening humidity.  The press squeezes the juice out of the corn and creates a yellow mash which you then pour into the previously shucked husks.  Fold the leaves up like a green Christmas present, stand them up in a big pot, fill it halfway with water, place it on the fogon, and let it steam for roughly 20 minutes.

There are a number of variations of tamales, some sweet, some savory.  Our's were filling-less yet delicious.  That night, I was fit to burst after being force-fed close to my body-weight in tamales lathered in mantequilla, fried tamale pancakes, and leftover corn-on-the-cob that tasted like a fresh batch of Orville Redenbacher's.

Helping and/or slowing down the process

Leticia, cooler than the other side of the pillow

Getting the batch ready for steaming

Leftover mash pancakes