Recipe: Mushroom Tamales

Whenever we get a new recipe book, hubby and I go through it and flag everything we want to cook.  He’d flagged this mushroom tamale recipe in our Cooking Light book like a thousand years ago.  And we FINALLY made it.

Ingredients:

Filling

4 garlic cloves, unpeeled

3 pasilla chiles, stemmed and seeded

¼ cup dried porcini mushrooms

3 sun-dried tomatoes, packed without oil

2 cups boiling water

1 large ripe tomato

Cooking spray

½ cup finely chopped onion

2 cups chopped portobello mushroom caps

½ teaspoon dried oregano

1 ½ tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

½ teaspoon salt

20 large dried corn husks

Dough

2/3 cup fresh corn kernels

1 ½ cups coarse-ground masa harina

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 1/3 cups warm vegetable broth, divided

3 tablespoons vegetable shortening

Directions:

The Dough

1. Place the corn in a food processor and process until smooth.

2. Combine the masa, baking powder and ½ teaspoon salt. Add 2 cups of the broth.

3. Beat the shortening with a mixer until fluffy. Add corn and ¼ cup of broth to the shortening and mix until well blended.

4. Add the masa mixture and beat until well blended.

The Filling

1. In a large cast-iron skillet, cook the garlic until blackened. Remove, cool and peel.

2. Add the chiles to the pan and flatten with a spatula.  Cook 20 seconds on each side or until blackened.

3. Place chiles, porcini, and sun-dried tomatoes in a bowl.  Pour boiling water over them.  Cover and let stand for 30 minutes or until tender. Add 2 ½ tables spoons of the soaking liquid, the chile mixture, and the garlic to a food processor and process for 1 minute or until smooth.

4. In a skillet cook the tomato for 15 minutes or until blackened, turning frequently.  Remove, let cool slightly, peel, core, and chop.

5. In the same pan, coated with cooking spray, cook the onion.  Add the chile mixture, tomato, portobello mushrooms and oregano.  Cook for 15 minutes stir in the cilantro, lime juice and salt. Set aside.

The Corn Husks

1. Put the cornhusks in a large bowl of hot water, weigh them down with another bowl. Soak at least 30 minutes.  Drain and pat dry. Tear 4 corn husks lengthwise into 16 ½ inch wide straps.

Putting it all Together

1. Open a cornhusk, curved side up. Place 3 tablespoons of dough in the center and spread evenly into a 4x2 inch rectangle. Put 1 ½ tablespoons dough in the center of the dough.  Take one long side of the husk, and roll dough around filling making sure dough seals around it. Fold empty tapered end of the husk over the bundle. Tie the husk strip around tamale and folded end to secure.

2. Stand tamales upright (open end up) in an Instant Pot or a vegetable steamer in a Dutch oven.  Add 1 inch of water, bring it to a boil.  Cover and steam tamales 1 ½ hours or until husks pull away cleanly.

Remove the tamales from the steamer and peel away the corn husks and enjoy!

Please note this took MF forever and I won’t be making these anytime soon.  Also, I want to add some type of meat to this because the mushrooms were kinda meh.  But overall it was tasty. Give it a try…but only if you have several hours you want to fill with cooking.

Recipe inspiration found in the All-New Complete Cooking Light Cookbook.

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