Nowhere but Home A Novel - By Liza Palmer Page 0,98

the stove. I put the bowl of masa in front of Harlan and set down a piece of plastic wrap and a spoon. He eyes them suspiciously. Cody is next to the pork-and-sweet-mole filling.

“Now, watch me,” I say.

“Yes, Chef,” the Dent boys say in unison.

I pull a banana leaf from the stack and hold it next to an open flame. It immediately softens and becomes pliable. I walk over to the bowl of masa, take a heaping spoonful, and put it in the center of the banana leaf. I grab the plastic wrap and set it over the masa. I smooth the masa out using the plastic wrap to make it as smooth as possible. “Leave enough on the edges so we can fold these leaves over, remember,” I say. Harlan and Cody nod. Jace wanders over, enthralled with the process. I pull the plastic wrap off and show them the smooth layer of masa just beneath. I take some of the pork from the skillet on the stovetop and then some of the sweet mole and put it on top of the pork. “Always remember to not overfill. Less is more in this situation.” They all nod. Including Jace. I settle the now filled banana leaf on the counter. “Now. The folding. Y’all ready?” They nod. “Fold it toward you, just to halfway, see? The other half away from you. Now the bottom, now the top,” I say, lifting up the little green bundle of goodness for viewing.

“Toward you is first,” Cody says.

“Exactly,” I say.

“Like an envelope,” Jace says.

“Right, exactly. Then you put them in this big pot here where we’re going to steam them,” I say, placing my finished bundle in the pot.

“You don’t tie ’em up with something?” Cody asks.

“These banana leaves are big enough so that we don’t have to, but if you find it getting away from you just use strips of another leaf as twine, you know? On both ends,” I say, using my little bundle as an example.

“But that’s only if we mess it up,” Cody says.

“Right,” I say, with a smile.

“So we don’t want to be doing that,” he says.

“Right,” I say.

“Let’s do this,” Harlan says, walking to the front of the assembly line. Harlan takes a banana leaf and holds it next to the open flame and the leaf softens. He moves to the masa, puts a heaping spoonful on the leaf, and grabs a piece of plastic wrap.

“The only thing this stuff ever sticks to is itself,” Harlan says, fighting with the plastic wrap.

“You made it look so easy,” Cody says. I can’t help but smile.

“It’s like getting a linoleum bubble out, you know? Smooth it out,” Jace says, doing the motions with his hands as well. Harlan watches him and turns around and tries again.

“There it is,” Cody says, as Harlan lifts away the plastic wrap victoriously. Harlan gives him a wide smile.

“Now the filling,” I say, pointing to the two skillets. Harlan spoons in the right amount and pauses before he has to fold.

“Toward you is first,” Cody says, his hands doing the motion as well. Harlan nods.

“Toward you, away from you, bottom, then the top,” Harlan narrates his folding. He flips the little green bundle over and there it is.

“You did it!” I say, patting him on the back.

“Well, all right there. Look at that!” Cody says, beaming at the finished tamale.

“Well, looka there,” Jace says.

“Ha, well look at that,” Harlan says, flipping the little bundle over again and again.

“Now, put it in the pot for steaming. Cody? You ready?” I ask.

“As I’ll ever be,” Cody says, grabbing a banana leaf. Jace meanders back over to his chair and newspaper.

Cody stumbles through his first tamale, but gets it sooner than he thought he would. We move and work, keeping pace like an old waltz. Weaving in and out we soon find that it works better to stay at one station and just pass the tamale down the line. I, of course, end up at the masa-smoothing station. In no time we’ve got our pot ready to start steaming.

“How’s the cabrito coming?” I ask Cody as we put the lid on the tamale pot.

“Good . . . I think. I mean, I don’t know, Chef,” Cody says, walking over to his cabrito.

“Have you tasted it?” I ask.

“No, Chef,” Cody says.

Everyone’s quiet.

“You know she’s going to make you taste it,” Jace says, from behind his paper. We all break out laughing. Cody takes a fork and spears a tiny