South Western dishes was Re: SC - Huevos con salsa-

[snowfire at mail.snet.net]

- -Poster: Elysant <Snowfire at mail.snet.net>

There are some other Mexican/South Western dishes I'd like to ask about 
please:

Tamales     The sweet version of these are a tradition at Christmas in West  
            Texas.  Where do they originate?  I was wondering if perhaps the 
	    cooking method of rolling the meat or raisins etc. up in corn
	    meal an then wrapping and boiling it in corn shucks might be 
	    quite old?

Chiles Rienos (?spelling)  Modern or not?

Enchiladas  I learned recently that originally the same cornmeal was packed  
            around the Enchilada filling as is used in Tamales.  Nowerdays 
	    tortillas are used instead.  Is this dish also older?

Lastly.     Blue tortillas.  I saw a documentary on the TV a few years       
            ago that explained that there was a certain New Mexican tribe 
	    (Hopi maybe) that had traditionally cooked blue tortillas, 	    
	    and on analysis by the anthro people, it was found that by adding 
	    just enough of a certain ingredient (don't remember what it was 
	    sorry) to the tortilla recipe, the cooked tortillas acheived a 
	    certain blue colour (they were being cooked very thinly on a 
	    heated bakestone). Apparently the reaction causing the blue 
	    colour produced or activated a certain a mineral not otherwise 
	    found in the diet of the people.   

	    As weird as this sounds (maybe not?), I just wonder if anyone    
            else had heard anything about this.  I know blue tortillas are 
	    available in stores sometimes, as well as the nacho chips, but 
	    they're made of blue corn and are not the same as the ones 	    
mentioned above?

Elysant
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