Easy Vegan Tamales

Easy Vegan Tamales

I found this website that had a recipe billed as Instant Pot Tamales.  What I discovered about Instant Pot Tamales is that the tamale prep is pretty much the same. You could roast some pork in the instant pot to use in the tamales, but since these are vegetarian (vegan actually) I didn’t do that. The raw tamales are cooked in the instant pot and that saves quite a lot of time over the steam on the stove method. 

The more I have read about tamales the more I realize that they are like any other traditional dish, there are as many methods, recipes and variations as there are cooks. At our house, we only make tamales once a year unless we have a very good reason. It is a whole family event and takes most of a day.  We make lots, gorge ourselves, pass out the rest and freeze them. 

This past year we decided to try tamales on banana leaves in addition to the traditional corn husks. I really liked how moist the tamales were. The problem with the banana leaves is that they are slicker than the corn husks and the masa doesn’t spread as easily. 

When I saw this procedure, it wasn’t a traditional tamale as I was used to, but I knew it would be so much easier that we might do them more than once a year. This recipe doesn’t spread the masa and wrap it around the filing. It blends the filling and the masa and makes more of a dumpling. 

Since my motto is that a recipe is only a suggestion… well these are only kind of like what was on the website. I added the Soy Chorizo. If you like chorizo and haven’t discovered Soy Chorizo, stop what you are doing and go to Trader Joe’s or Aldis and get a package. It is life changing. It is also vegan. 

Ingredients:

2 cups frozen corn

1 medium sweet potato

1 bell pepper or equivalent

1 poblano

1 medium onion

6-10 cloves garlic

12 oz soy chorizo

2 cups masa

2 tsp salt

2 tbsp chili powder

½ cup vegetable broth or other flavorful liquid

Banana leaves or corn husks to wrap

Instructions

Start by putting your frozen corn and sweet potato into the oven to roast at 350°. This should take about 30 minutes. 

During this time you can dice your peppers, onions and garlic. 

We eat with our eyes. I love starting any recipe with multi colored bell peppers. Since I didn’t really need 4 whole peppers in this, I used the whole poblano, but took a face off of each – a red, yellow and orange bell pepper. Diced, these made a nice colorful pepper blend. 

In a skillet, cook the chorizo, onions and garlic together. I used a non-stick skillet and didn’t need any oil. If that doesn’t work for you, add a little oil to prevent sticking. When the onions are tender add the peppers and cook until the peppers wilt. 

When my corn was roasted my potato was still not quite done. I put it in the microwave for 2 minutes and it was perfect.  It slipped right out of its skin. Dice the cooked and peeled potato. 

In a large bowl put the chorizo mix, the corn, potato, chili powder and salt. Mix well. 

Add the masa and mix again. 

This mixture needs to hold together in a dumpling type structure when you squeeze it in your hand. If the mix is too dry add the vegetable broth and mix again. The picture shows what it should look like when the consistency is right. 

Wrap the tamales in corn husks or banana leaves. I used banana leaves. If you need instructions on the construction of the tamales – corn husks or banana leaves, let me know. I will try to take some pictures of that and explain it.

Once all the tamales are wrapped and tied (if you tie them), take your Instant pot steaming basket and place it in the instant pot. Put one cup of water (I used the little plastic measure that came with the pot. I assume that is a cup, but I haven’t really looked closely.)

Pack the tamales in, standing them up against each other. You can put them in pretty tightly. 

Close the lid and cook on high pressure for 30 minutes. I found that the meat/stew button on my pot is the right time and pressure so I just used that. I also left them in the pot while the pressure came down and didn’t use the quick release. That took about 20 minutes. 

I took one out to text it and be sure it was holding together and not sticking to the wrap. They were perfect and really yummy.