I LOVE the smell of tamales cooking!

Today was annual Tamale Making Day. I look forward to Tamale Day every year; it began, oh, around five years ago. A dear friend, who also happens to be a neighbor, invited me over because she had all the ingredients for tamale making, and no one to make tamales with (another friend who had been going to make tamales with her had had a change of plans).
We embarked on a tamale making adventure that day, neither of us ever having made tamales before, and what began as a rather haphazard experiment has become a day that is looked forward to by both families with at least as much anticipation as the holidays themselves.

Last year (Tamale Day 2008) we made nearly everything from scratch, including the masa, and our goal for this year (Tamale Day 2009) was to make everything but the chicken stock (used in the masa) from scratch.

We did it!

Ingredients:
Masa - harina (masa flour), butter, salt, shortening, and chicken stock
Chicken - 10 lbs, boiled in advance
Pork - 8 lbs, slow cooked overnight
Red Sauce - dried California chilies, garlic, cumin, salt, flour, olive oil
Green Sauce - tomatillos, jalapeno peppers, garlic, salt, cilantro, cumin, onions, oil (for sauteing)

We made:
Pork with Red Sauce Tamales
Chicken with Green Sauce Tamales
Cheese (Pepper Jack) and Jalapeno Pepper Tamales

And, just for fun, we looked up a recipe for Pineapple and Cinnamon Tamales, at the request of Dani's sister (she joined us this year), and Dani threw them together right at the end. We haven't tried them yet; we'll have to see what happens - we could add a new regular flavor.

All in all a good day, and the best part of it is enjoying the smell of the tamales cooking as I write this...yum!

Baking All Day!

Today was Baking Day. Baking Day isn't a holiday tradition (because I don't need that kind of pressure around the holidays), and, in fact, isn't a tradition at all. Baking Day is simply whatever day I designate (usually about a week in advance) to spend all day baking, and it happens whenever I have the required time, money and inclination--all at the same time.
Although it doesn't happen nearly as often as I believe I would like, the infrequency with which it occurs actually serves to make it that much more a luxurious indulgence, than an event that could otherwise become mundane, or worse, a dreaded obligation.

Monkey Boy joined me for the Baking extravaganza, and I enjoyed the chance to hang out with him all day as we baked.

On the queue for today were:
Rolled Sugar Cookies
Gingerbread
Snickerdoodles
Scones - many varieties of flavors, including, but not limited to: Cinnamon, Currant and traditional
On the Maybe queue: Gingerbread Men, and Chocolates

Managed all the cookies, the gingerbread and one batch of scones (cinnamon). However, for want of a sifter (and how is it that we no longer have a sifter, and I don't know about it? But, I digress...) we held off on the additional batches of scones, because they really do come out better when the flour has been sifted.

We ran out of time for working on the Maybes, but that is, after all, why they were on the Maybe queue!

Perhaps in the morning we will continue with the scones, as Amazing Husband and I ran out on a holiday related 'secret mission' this evening and included the purchase of a sifter in our otherwise Top Secret excursion.