Delta Hot Tamales Are Hotter Than Ever

Delta Hot Tamales Are Hotter Than Ever

 

In Mississippi, they do tamales their own way. Now, chefs are converging on the region to push the cornmeal-stuffed envelope even further

 

By Julia Reed in the Wall Street Journal

 

 

"YOU CAN PUT anything you want in a tamale. The possibilities are endless," said Eddie Hernandez, chef and co-founder of the Atlanta-based Taqueria del Sol restaurants. He's the reigning champion of the Delta Hot Tamale Festival, celebrity chef category, in my hometown of Greenville, Miss.

Delta "hots" themselves perfectly exemplify the tamale's malleable properties. Made with cornmeal instead of the lime-treated masa used in Mexico, a Delta hot is simmered (rather than steamed) in a spiced broth—hence the name. Though the dish's precise origin remains elusive, it's said that at one point in the 1920s a few Mexican cotton pickers made their way up from the Rio Grande Valley, toting a recipe that was then transformed by local African-American cooks—possibly aided by southern Italians who'd settled in the area. Whatever. By 1936, tamales were so entrenched in Delta culture that Robert Johnson, who'd made his pact with the devil just up the road from Greenville, recorded a song about them called "They're Red Hot."

Plenty of vendors and home cooks are still making tamales in the Delta, and three years ago a trio of enterprising Greenville women launched a festival to celebrate our claim to culinary fame. At the first fest, more than 30 tamale makers competed, and 10,000 people turned up.

After such an auspicious beginning (Greenville has since trademarked the slogan "Hot Tamale Capital of the World"), the festival has drawn more talent each year. Last October, a handful of chefs and writers came to participate in the Literary/Culinary Mashup, a daylong series of panels leading up to the fest. The chefs, who stayed to compete in the newly inaugurated "celebrity" category, turned out to be mightily inspired by the form.

"It's popular now to have street food on a fine dining menu," said Rogan Lechthaler, who, with his Mississippi-born wife, Abby, owns the restaurant the Downtown Grocery in Ludlow, Vt. "Tamales are a cool medium that not everybody's doing—unlike tacos and Korean barbecue." Mr. Lechthaler ended up adding the tamale he'd entered—made with smoked Vermont lamb and garnished with Vermont buttermilk crème fraîche—to the Grocery's menu.

Donald Link, whose New Orleans restaurant empire includes his flagship Herbsaint, came with chefs Stephen Stryjewski (his partner in Cochon and Butcher) and Ryan Prewitt (his partner in Pêche). Their tamale was a riff on one of Butcher's star offerings—the boudin—mixing the sausage's meat and seasonings with cornmeal instead of rice.

Michael Hudman and Andy Ticer, chefs and owners of Andrew Michael Italian Kitchen and Hog & Hominy in Memphis, Tenn., grew up eating hots. But, said Mr. Ticer, "as chefs, we want to take something that's been there forever and mess it up." Their tamale was finished off with fried chicken skins and a tangy Alabama-style white barbecue sauce. Still, Mr. Ticer cautioned, for all its elasticity, "a tamale is a delicate thing. It takes a lot more finesse than a taco."

It was perhaps unfair to include Mr. Hernandez, a native of Monterrey, Mexico, in the mix. Though he was judged on his pork tamale, made with his own hand-ground masa, he brought two more: a corn and poblano version as well as a crowd-pleasing blueberry dessert tamale. In the prep kitchen, after the chefs traded bites, Mr. Prewitt broke out in a grin and said, "We should go on and rename this thing the 'Let's Give Eddie the Trophy Contest.' "

The judges did crown Mr. Hernandez king, but it was a close race. In October the same contenders are coming back to cook at the festival's kick-off dinner. Lest we think his tamales anything but authentic to the region, Mr. Hernandez plans to substitute peaches for blueberries in his dessert version—his "homage to the South."