Anyway, I don't think that last post really worked, but I left it up. Actually, I put it up, then took it down, but I realized I'm to lazy to fix it so I just put it back up. I don't bother to really edit or think much about my posts, so sometimes they just don't work. I'm a sometime blogger, not an author. I don't know why I am telling you that, but i'm to lazy to delete it. It's my blog! If you don't like it, go shove it up your ojojona and read something else. Ojojona is a town in Honduras where I am going for a wedding (sorry, paternity leave remember?) in late April.
Anyway, today I want to talk about my cooking. I know what some of you are thinking, "That mind! That body! And he cooks too! How is that man still single?" Well, if you call cooking frying everything in olive oil and garlic , then well, yeah, sure, I cook. How am I still single? There isn't enough bandwidth on the internet for me to get into that one my friends.
Anyway, I wanted to talk in particular about my tamales. Tamales are tough for me because they don't really follow my normal pattern for food (cut food, heat oil and garlic, cook food in oil and garlic, eat with rice or tortillas). Tamales are made with corn flour, water, and not much else. You make the dough, put something inside the dough, wrap it all in a corn husk or banana leaf, boil, and walla! a present you unwrap for your stomach. Mmm!
Anyway, tonight I ate some of my tamales and I can safely say they are the 2nd worst tamales ever! The only tamales that were worse were the 1st time I ever made tamales, they weren't even edible and I got rid of them by knocking pigeons off my balcony with hard tamale bits. The pigeons were attracted by the tamale I spread on the porch because it's sort of like bread, and as the pigeons flew in I smacked 'em with tamale! Here's tamale in your eye you flying rat! Ha ha ha.
Anyway, I can't figure out why i can't make tamales better and it makes me sad :( . I can make me some killer beans now (cooking beans every day for almost 2 years and you pick up some tricks, like the one with the tomato and the jumping bean. Actually, that was a joke - remember the one where the tomato and the jumping bean walk into a bar? The bartender looks at the avacado and says, "what do I look like? Guacamole?" Ha ha ha - it's funny in spanish...).
Anyway, this blog is really just to try your patience and see if anyone finishes it. I'm even sober, not a drop in me! This is why I don't have to drink much or do other recreational drugs, my mind is already so fragile. So my tamales are terrible and it's a bummer. In Honduras, we used to eat two types of tamales. The first were called tamalitos and they were little and sweet, just like hondurans. They consisted of corn meal and sugar, wrapped in a corn husk and boiled. They were great. The other tamales were big and full of all sorts of things, and they were called nacatamales. Naca might have a meaning, but I don't know what it was even though I asked. For a while I was using naca as a prefix for anything wonderful, for example, "Ay que bueno que va a empezar mi nacanovela!" (translated as something like Oy how great my wonderful soap opera is about to start). I usually said this when Pasion de Gavilanes was about to start because that show was the naca-entertainment! I seriously tried to buy the DVD a while back but couldn't find it. Boo! I also used naca to describe Myrita because she was my favorite naca-hermanita in town, coolest happiest 10 year old ever. Oh, the nacamemories.
Anyway, Hondurans were notorious for eating nacatamales around christmas, and I had piles of nacatamales from people my last christmas in site. I couldn't decline the tamale because that would be rude, so I ate them all. Honestly, between you and me, I gave some to my neighbors dog as a peace offering because I had to buy her protection and because I couldn't eat them all. I felt guilty about that though. Then everyone asked me who made the best nacatamales in town and I said my mom back in the states. Awww...the nacamentiras.
Anyway, the nacatamales were notorious among the peace corps community because every tamale had a single piece of meat, pork or beef, in the center and it was usually on the bone so you had to very careful while eating them. Not only that, it was a single piece of meat and mostly fat, the good fat though. This was tradition, and i'm not sure why they didn't pull the meat off the bone but they didn't. This drove some volunteers crazy, but I didn't care. I love nacatamales. I love them if I'm on a bus, I love them if I'm in a car. No matter where I are, I love them love them near and far. I love them in leaf or corn husk, I love them morn and eve and dusk. I will not share them with an animal, unless the pile looks just unbearable. I love them even when I'm full, I love them even though I'm dull. I love them love them love them see, but I cannot cook them woe is me.
Anyway, I can't believe i am even bothering to keep writing but what the heck. So the first time I made tamales I overcooked them. The second time, a definite improvement, they were still bad. So I'm looking for advice. I want help from someone who can make tamales that are worthy of the naca. And I'd like her to speak spanish, be between 5'6 and 5'10 with dark skin and dark hair, and like to travel. If she's independantly wealthy, that's fine too. Thank you for your help.
Anyway, I had a really stressful day at work by the way... Time to go watch House, it's the naca-programa!
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