Lilianas Tamales Locations (2024)

FAQs

Who is the owner of tamales Lilianas? ›

LOS ANGELES -- When Juan Manuel Santoyo and his wife started selling tamales on a street corner, they never imagined that they would one day run one of the most successful restaurants in East Los Angeles, Tamales Liliana's, and sell millions of tamales each year.

There are many popular tamales in Oaxaca's most tourist-filled region: salsa verde de pollo, chicken in a sauce of chiles serranos, tomatillos, scented with pungent epazote; mole coloradito thickened with sweet plantains.

Origin. Tamales originated in Mesoamerica as early as 8000 to 5000 BC. The preparation of tamales is likely to have spread from the indigenous cultures in Guatemala and Mexico to the rest of Latin America. According to archaeologists Karl Taube, William Saturno, and David Stuart, tamales may date from around 100 AD.

Tamal is a corn-based dough, filled with different types of ingredients, usually wrapped in corn, banana, and maguey leaves. What is this? Because there are more than 500 types of tamales in Mexico, each region has a different Mexican tamale recipe.

The word tamal derives from the Nahuatl tamalli, which means steamed cornmeal dough. Nahuatl, the language of Aztecs, was spoken as early as the 7th century, but tamales existed long before then in Mesoamerica. Historians believe that the tamal may have originated as early as 8000 BC to 5000 BC.

The masa-based staple traces its origins to Mesoamerica and has countless iterations — around 500 types of tamales are credited to Mexico alone, plus bite-size chuchitos from Guatemala, sweet corn-filled ducunus from Belize, a Salvadoran variety that mixes masa with refried beans and many more.

Tamal is a very popular and commonly consumed dish. In Mexico, it is common to eat tamales in the morning for breakfast and on some festivities. The most important day for eating tamales is: 'Dia de la Candelaria' (Candlemas Day on 2nd February).

The price of a tamale on the street is between $15 to $20 Mexican pesos, which is about 75 cents or 1 dollar (USD).

It's generally fine to bring back cooked foods, so if you want to pack a to-go bag of your grandmother's tamales and handmade flour tortillas, go ahead.

Tamales are super nutritious and tasty; there's a reason they've been around for centuries! They have fiber, micronutrients, resistant starch, and protein that can promote health for many people. But tamales are so much more than just their nutrition facts.

Do you eat the corn husk on a tamale? ›

Be sure to remove the wrapper entirely from tamales steamed in corn husks. While plantain leaves are edible (though they're not usually consumed with the tamales), corn husks aren't, and could cause choking or an upset stomach if swallowed.

Mexico. You're likely most familiar with Mexican tamales. Mexican tamales feature corn masa wrapped in a corn husk (some regions use banana leaves, more on that in a second). Typically, the corn is dried, nixtamalized corn.

The most popular flavors are chicken and pork, but tamale filling options are almost endless. Alin developed a variety of savory and sweet options, including jalapeno and cheese, mole, pineapple, and sweet cream, but filling types can vary from family to family or from region to region.

The prices for the most popular protein fillings of chicken and pork and even spices for tamale-making are up. “The majority of the spices we use to give the flavor to [tamales] come from Mexico,” said Cruz. “Exporting them here has a higher price.

The singular word for tamales in Spanish is tamal.

Tamales are what brought Steve Barker to Grapevine about 6 years ago, but his passion for them goes way back. "I started selling tamales out of an old truck I had in Decatur, Texas" said Steve Barker. When it came time to give his new enterprise a name, he had to think what would be catchy.

Along with the dual recordkeeping allegation came others, including that Delia Lubin, founder and owner of the chain — which has restaurants across the Rio Grande Valley and San Antonio — had some of the plaintiffs clean her home.

Jaime Soltero Jr. started Tamale Boy as a catering company in 2008 called Mayahuel Catering. Tamale Boy has evolved into a food truck catering and restaurant business with Portland and Happy Valley brick and mortar locations.