if you are not busy a week from Saturday

there is a very small fiber event at Canterbury Shaker Village. I will be there, as will Sarah, of course, and who knows who else? I don't think there will be vendors. At the rate things are going, they're going to have to glue the fleece right back onto those sheep; today it was about 3 degrees F (that's TOO COLD in Celsius) when I woke up.

Sometime in April -- we'll say the 22nd -- Doug and I and the cats would like to have a Fiber Day, with food and perhaps a dye pot or so outside. Because we think it might be warm then. Easter is the 16th. There could be Easter-Egg-Dye Dyebaths. We can chat about the upcoming NH Sheep and Wool. Please think about whether you might come, and I will send anyone directions. Concord is about one and a half hours north of Boston. Henniker is sort of outside Concord, but not on the way to or from anywhere but Keene. The hot tub may be fixed by then, but that would be for people only, not for fiber.

In other news: Boring Anglo Girl makes Tamales! Angla? Anyway, they were easier than I thought and delicious.

I started with the recipe on mexgrocer.com and cut it in half. Most unusually I happened to have some actual chicken broth, made with garlic, onions, and GINGER!! (lots of it) from last week to mix with the masa harina.-- It is most unfortunate, but I think maybe the zest of the broth actually made a difference in the finished product. I usually just use water when things call for broth. I suppose that's why they make Bouillon-- and most of a rotisseried chicken. I had carved the chicken and I put most of the meat (for longer than necessary) in the Cuisinart with half an onion and a half a bunch of parsley, incidentally inventing the world's best chip-dip.

I did not have corn husks. I think asking us to buy corn husks in a package is a perfectly accurate insult to the Anglo cook*. I used parchment paper. I plopped masa onto the parchment paper, smoothed it out with a spoonful of salsa, and plopped chicken mixture onto that. Then I attempted to roll them, with too thick a layer of masa and too much chicken, not very envelopingly, but got them covered with parchment paper, and then I steamed them in my Chinese steamer for about 35 minutes. Heaven. All I need is the strange orange oily sauce, which I imagine is achiote. Mail-order achiote is on its way. I blame Rick Bayless for a lot of this, but the tamales were my fault entirely.

*You know how many Americans it takes to go ice-fishing? One to cut the hole and fifteen to push the boat in.