Chicken Tamales

I've been wanting to make tamales for a while and I bought a pack of frozen banana leaves about a month ago. For some reason I was thinking that they were really hard to make, but it turned out to be super easy. I didn't have any masa to make them the proper way (dough layered on the leaf, then topped with filling) so I just followed some of the easier recipes which have you mix the dough directly with the ingredients. I used corn meal mix. They came out pretty tasty, but slightly drier than I wanted, so next time I will buy some real masa and make a proper dough, maybe even with some lard.

 When I boiled the chicken, I made the broth really flavorful by adding chopped garlic, peppercorns, cumin seeds, a sofrito cube, and salt. But by mixing the corn meal mix directly into the stuffing, I really had no use for the broth. Next time I'll make the masa dough out of the reserved broth from boiling the chicken and do it the proper way. I'd also love to make these with chicharron.

Shredded chicken, pepperjack cheese, peas, and sautéed vegetables (onions, green chiles, jalapeño, garlic). The chicken was super easy to shred in the food processor, even while piping hot.

I didn't see any need to tie them, they stayed rolled up perfectly fine without string.  Into the tamalera! Provecho!