Taco and Tamale Tuesday: No Comas la Cáscara

Sort of makes you wonder where all those people who supposably voted for Joey and Kami are hiding out…aside from the obvious.

I live here in West Texas, probably 50% of the local population is Hispanic and has been that way as long as I can remember. My love for good Mexican food started as a youngster and has grown with age. In the oil fields of West Texas all you have to do to find the best Mexican food places is look for all the white trucks. The places won’t have any national names on them, most will be Mom and Pop places that have been in the family for generations. You need good food and lots of it to stay with the pace the oil patch requires and those little ladies won’t let you down. My favorite time of the years is Tamale Season, most call it Christmas. The ladies at the Catholic Church all get together and make tamales and I’ll usually get 10-12 dozen, that lasts about a week. Man can live on tamales alone. Maybe I’m just prejudice but no other ethnic cooking compares to a plate of good Mexican food. Get the house special and it’s usually a little bit of everything, finish a plate and you’ll be looking for a place to take a nap. Always eat the taco’s first, that way anything that breaks off just get’s mixed in with the refried beans or Spanish rice. My favorite dish is Chili Relleno made with Hatch Chili’s out of New Mexico. If GOD offered me one last meal before it was my time somebody is going to have to go to the Hatch Valley in New Mexico and pick up some fresh ones. Probably have to stop on the way back for a six pack of Tecate and fresh limes. My Heavenly meal!

I had a dinner party once when I lived in South Florida back around 78 or so.

I served homemade Mexican food since there were no Mexican restaurants in the near vicinity at the time.

One of my guests was a transplanted former NYC resident.

After dinner while cleaning up I noticed that his place setting had no corn husks left from the tamales.

I asked him what he did with them and he said, “I ate them.”...............

When President Ford was battling Ronald Reagan in the GOP primaries in a bid for a full term in 1976, he was served Mexican food on a campaign swing through Texas just before that state’s primary. Unfamiliar with such cuisine, he failed to remove the corn shuck from his tamale and bit into it. That miscue cost him the state.

All of our Mexican restaurants in the Pocatello area are family operations (aside from Taco Bell). Each offers a slightly different cuisine. Our "Chili's" died and is being replaced with Garcia's (Sonoran) in early June. I've already met the new manager. Looking forward to it. Tres Hermanos took over for another family operation that had to leave due to being "undocumented". Frankly, I would have sponsored the family in a heartbeat. I had enjoyed their great food and service for 8 years when they faced having to return to Mexico. The family that took over are friends that are "holding down" the business as long as necessary.

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