Recipe Butternut Squash Tamales

[CraigC]

Ingredients
Dough
3 cups diced butternut squash
3 cups vegetable broth
1/2 cup chopped scallion, (white and green) 1 bunch or 6 scallions
1 tablespoon canned chipotle en adobo sauce (chiles for filling)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground cumin
3 cups masa harina
3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 cup vegetable oil

Filling
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 small bunch scallions, (white and green) finely chopped, about 1/2 cup
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 chipotle chiles in adobo, sliced
1 teaspoon ground cumin
2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup Spanish olives with pimentos, rinsed and chopped
1/2 cup golden raisins
1/4 cup capers, rinsed
1 cup vegetable broth
1 scant teaspoon finely grated orange zest
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
About 16 corn husks or 22 corn husks for smaller tamales (soaked in water until soft), Drained
Hot sauce for serving, optional

Directions
1) For dough: Put butternut squash in a medium pot with broth, scallion, adobo sauce, garlic, salt, and cumin. Bring to a simmer and cook until squash is tender, about 15 minutes. Remove the squash with a slotted spoon, and reserve the broth. Set aside 2/3 of the squash for the filling, then mash the remaining squash is a large bowl.
2) Mix in the masa with a fork. Slowly pour the seasoned broth over the dough, mixing with a fork (or hands) until smooth. Slowly stir in oils, a little at a time until dough is soft and moist. Cover with plastic wrap, set aside.
3) For filling: Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the scallions, garlic, chiles, cumin and salt and cook until soft, about 1 minute,. Add reserved squash, olives, raisins, capers, and cook, stirring gently, until well combined, about 1 minute longer. Add broth and orange zest and cook, stirring occasionally until broth is slightly absorbed, about 2 minutes. Stir in cilantro, remove from heat.
4) To assemble: Cut 2 husks into 24-inch lengths about 1/2-inch wide. Place other soaked corn husks on cutting board, open side up. Place about a 1/4 cup dough in the center of each husk, leaving enough corn husk free to enclose tamale. Spoon 2 to 3 tablespoons filling on top. Then cover filling with about 2 to 3 tablespoons more of dough. Wrap the husks around the filling and twist and tie ends with reserved strips to make party favor shaped tamales.
5) Set up a 10-inch steamer basket. Lay tamales in steamer, cover and cook until the husks get slightly translucent, about 50 minutes. Remove tamales from steamer, and let rest for 5 to 10 minutes before serving with additional hot sauce if desired.

The dough

The Filling

Filling the husks

In the steamer

Finished

 

[medtran49]

We made the dough and filling the day before, refrigerated, then took them both out of fridge for a couple of hours to let them warm to room temp before making the tamales.

It takes about an hour in water for the corn husks to soften. BTW, it's better to soften too many than end up needing more. Corn husks are cheap, your time and electricity are not.

When you have stacked the tamales in the pan, cover the tops with extra corn husks to keep condensate from dripping down into the filled tamales.

We used currants instead of the golden raisins. Either would be fine, they are needed to add just a tiny hint of sweetness to go with the saltiness and heat. I told Craig the filling was a vegan/vegetarian picadillo.

 

[Morning Glory]

Great step by step photos. I like the idea of putting squash in the dough and with all the other ingredients it must be a very tasty dough. The filling sounds lovely - spicy, sweet, sour and piquant. So - given I can't get corn husks what can be used instead?

 

[medtran49]

Foil, parchment paper, banana leaves, even clean fine-weave cotton cloth (no fabric softener or dryer sheets). You could also make a casserole style dish by dividing the dough in half, spreading half on bottom of baking dish, then filling, then spreading remainder of dough on top, covering and baking at 400 F for 30 minutes, uncover and 10 minutes more. I'm guessing at time/temp by looking at similar recipes.

 

[Morning Glory]

Foil, parchment paper, banana leaves, even clean fine-weave cotton cloth (no fabric softener or dryer sheets). You could also make a casserole style dish by dividing the dough in half, spreading half on bottom of baking dish, then filling, then spreading remainder of dough on top, covering and baking at 400 F for 30 minutes, uncover and 10 minutes more. I'm guessing at time/temp by looking at similar recipes.

Thanks - I was thinking baking paper (parchment paper). I have some masa harina blue which might be fun to use. Re the dough, is it quite a wet dough? I'm going by the photos... it looks as if its spread out with a palette knife on the corn husks.

 

[medtran49]

It's not really wet. The oil gives it that sheen/wet look. I used the red spatula to spread it or you could use an off-set spatula/palatte knife.

This dough was actually much easier to manipulate and spread than the traditional dough made with lard.

BTW, don't skip rinsing off the olives and capers. The original recipe didn't say to, so we didn't, and both of us thought the filling was a bit salty.

Whatever you use for a wrapper, just make sure it's in a rectangle long enough to fold up the bottom like you can see in the left bottom steamer picture so the dough and filling don't ooze out before the dough sets.

 

[Morning Glory]

It's not really wet. The oil gives it that sheen/wet look. I used the red spatula to spread it or you could use an off-set spatula/palatte knife.

This dough was actually much easier to manipulate and spread than the traditional dough made with lard.

BTW, don't skip rinsing off the olives and capers. The original recipe didn't say to, so we didn't, and both of us thought the filling was a bit salty.

Whatever you use for a wrapper, just make sure it's in a rectangle long enough to fold up the bottom like you can see in the left bottom steamer picture so the dough and filling don't ooze out before the dough sets.

Points taken on board! Now I have to make sure I have all the ingredients and scale down the recipe to make fewer tamales. I think I have most of the ingredients.

 

[medtran49]

FYI, tamales freeze well. Cook them, individually freeze, bag, then take out what you want, pop in microwave for a few minutes to thaw and heat, then eat!