Vegan Tamales

With the holidays coming up I had to find a way to replace my favorite New Mexican holiday dish, tamales. I would usually make an exception and make this dish the one time I indulged in pork but not this year. My friend Lorraine had made lentil and red chile tamales and I was inspired to make a green chile version.
First I set off to the local grower's market to gather all the zucchini and squash I could find. Turns out all I could find was zucchini, so I made it work.

The insides:

First start a pot of black beans boiling this will take most of the day to finish, cook according to the package

Cut up the zucchini in pretty large chunks, it cooks down pretty small. I had 6 medium size

Saute the zucchini and some garlic and onion, to taste I don't like a ton of onion.

Add in the chopped green chile toward the end.

I stored all of the filling over night and mashed and strained the beans the next morning. You don't want the filling to run or you will have a mess of a tamale. The more paste-like the better.

The Masa:

4 cups masa

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup melted coconut oil

3 vegan "beef" bouillon cubes dissolved in 3 cups of water

1 package of dried corn husks, I bought 2 just to be sure.

In a large bowl mix the masa, baking powder and salt together. Add the coconut oil and mix well, then add the water and bouillon mixture. Stir well, you can add water as needed till it is a spongy texture.
You will want to soak the corn husks in a large bowl of warm water before you fill them.

Thankfully I have a mother who is well versed on the art of making tamales and she was very precise with her thickness of masa and picking which corn husks would be suitable those are her hands in the photo above. It's an inexact science, just don't tell her that!
My mom's method is something like this: find 2 fairly large husks and put them together, like a fan. Spread the masa on the middle 2/3 of the husk, don't make it too thick but enough that the filling can't leak through, we were using about 3 heaping tablespoons full of masa. Add the filling to the center, we used about 1 1/2 tablespoons. It will become obvious how much filling will fit. Fold one end over the filling and then fold the other end over that one. You can then fold up the bottom section, creating a burrito of sorts. Tear several of the husks up into "strings" and use these to secure the tamale, wrap it around and then tie a knot.
To cook them you need a double boiler sort of idea. Mom has a strainer that sits in the pot that works quite well, a plate small enough would do the job too I think. Add water to the pan so that the bottom of the tamales are in the water. Keep the water boiling, you will have to add water pretty frequently. and the tamales cooking until the masa peels away from the husk at the top. It took about an hour. I got about 3 dozen tamales out of this recipe. I froze the rest so I could easily defrost and eat. 

This was our set up for easy assembly of tamales. It can get a little messy.

The tamales, rolled and ready for the stove. 

I took these tamales to my friend Laura's annual Turkanza holiday party last night and I am proud to say that they were a hit!