Saturday, September 13, 2008

West Indian Parade Tamale

Riding on Sweet Tea's coat tails I'll post just a few pics and one of a lovely, delicious find from the West Indian Parade. Let me introduce you to my new greasy friend, the Caribbean Tamale.


Hell yeah, it looks good huh?! The maza tasted like there was some potato in it and there was definitely a lot of pork fat involved and that did not deter me one bit! Once I dug in I was a little disappointed at the ratio of fat to tender pork in the chunks of meat, but the green olives and heavily spiced sauce made it a unique find at the parade. So where did I get this? Well, where do you usually get tamales? From a older lady selling them on the corner from a cooler. Yeah, in L.A. you get them from a shopping cart, but nevertheless they were homemade and great! Wait, let me read that again, am I saying I'd rather have them from a shopping cart? Well, you can take the girl out of the barrio but you can't take...... well you know the saying.

I also had the crab and cabbage, but it was dry, overcooked and utterly unremarkable, which was a shame because I'm a sucker for crabs.

Crabby goodness

Lastly, a lovely drug store shop with an old and beautiful sign. Bye bye kiddos. 

Great sign

1 comment:

Sweet Tea said...

Oooo, that tamale looks a little like the divine ones my Guatemalan neighbor used to give me. Hers were almost square, wrapped in banana leaf instead of corn husk, with a little red sauce, a green olive, and a prune in each one. When I asked her what meat was in them (before I first ate one and learned to beg at her door), she pointed at her barrel chest and said, "I use-a, I use-a, I use-a de rrribb."

I am now hopelessly spoiled on the tamale front.