Cooking Lessons

My husbands parent's live a few hours South of Chicago, so we made a quick road trip down to see them. It has been a year since I visited, so it was nice to give them a big hug. Before they knew we were coming out they had asked a family to come and teach them how to make tamales.

It turned out to be a fun cooking lesson for everybody.

Making tamales is quite the process, and I now understand why you only make them for special occasions. I also quickly realized why you wouldn't be able to just follow a recipe and figure it out on your own.

Just to give you an idea of the process; first you boil the meat for 2 hours, then you spend another 2 hours prepping and assembling the tamales, then another 2 hours to steam them. It took up all of Saturday morning, but it was really fun and the final product made it totally worth it. Can you believe this was my first time eating a tamale? I have a feeling I won't be able to eat one from a restaurant because I know it just won't be the same.