Mexican Tamales
Have a chicken cooked tender in boiling water to cover; remove the meat and chop it fine; return the bones to the broth. From fresh corn husks select a wide leaf of husk for each tamale, or use dry husks steamed until pliable. Remove and discard the seeds from a dozen red chili peppers and chop the pods very fine; peel six large tomatoes and squeeze the seeds from them. Mix the tomato and pepper and let simmer twenty minutes, or until well reduced. Stir enough of the hot chicken liquor into three cups of corn meal to thoroughly moisten it, then let it stand half an hour. When everything is ready, mix the tomato and pepper with the chicken, adding a teaspoonful or more of salt as is needed to season. Salt should also be added to the corn meal, if the broth in which it was mixed had not been seasoned. Put a layer of corn meal into the corn husk and on this put two tablespoonfuls of the chicken and tomato mixture. Let the chicken come nearly to the ends of the corn meal, and the corn meal well up to the ends of the husk. Keeping the husk between the fingers and the meal, fold the meal over the chicken, from each side, to enclose the chicken completely; roll the husks over the whole, turn up the ends and tie them securely, using narrow strips torn from the husks for the purpose. Put the tamales on the top of the bones in the chicken broth, taking care that the bones keep them well out of the broth. Cover closely and let simmer one hour. Serve hot.