A Christmas Favorite

For Christmas, one of my traditional favorites is eating a tamale or two or three, or four, etc. Some of my friends include the making of tamales as their tradition. Mothers, sisters, cousins, grandchildren all get into the act of making tamales for the Christmas season. Every year I hear my friends say, "It is getting to be too hard to make the tamales," but every year I hear reports of their homemade tamales. One year I helped smear meat mixture on the corn husks and decided to begin my own tradition of going to La Casita, standing in a long line, and buying the tamales. While in line, I see friends, everyone is in a festive mood, strangers become friends, and the line moves at a good pace!

I used to go to La Casita on 44th & Tennyson until it closed and the restaurant/store moved to a small place where they also sold La Casita tamales at Tejon and 35th Avenue. Before long the small "hole in the wall" was remodeled and the current restaurant opened its doors.

In  the past, I would purchase tamales for affairs at the office and came to know the owner, Paul Sandoval. He always gave me a good deal because I worked for the Archdiocese. Paul began the business around 1974 and one of the things he would tell me was, "What I serve here, I would also serve at home." Last year when I picked up my tamales, I heard the sad news that he had passed away in 2012.


My favorite is the green chile tamale with just the right bite to it. I like the red tamale also, but I usually make my red chile de ristra to pour over the red tamale. I found out from the Internet that 12,000 tamales are made daily and for the holidays it's over 225,000 tamales!

Tomorrow I am taking my tradition of tamales to a Christmas pot luck for my book club. It won't be the original amount I had planned to take because I have already scarfed down three of the delicious green chili tamales! I hope that by tomorrow I will have enough to take to the pot luck, after all, it is still some hours away!  What ever the amount that makes it to the pot luck, I hope everyone enjoys the tamales as much as I do!