For many Tulsans, Christmas time isn’t just about finding the best hot chocolate or holiday light display. They’re on the hunt for tamales.
The dish — a corn-based dough with fillings and wrapped in a dried corn husk and steamed — is a staple in the Latino community. Restaurant owners, food truck operators and home cooks make and sell them during the Christmas season.
TamaleBoyz in west Tulsa sold 425 dozen orders during last year’s holiday season, owner Elida Ruiz said. This year they’re aiming for 250 orders.
This doesn’t include the tamales needed for the restaurant and their food truck in Bixby, though. That would bring the number closer to 700 dozen sold last year.
It’s pretty calm for them so far this holiday season, Ruiz said. They haven’t fully promoted their Christmas availability because they have less staff.
In the meantime, they’ve focused on catering events and hope to promote Christmas availability this weekend.
Claudia Jaramillo, another local tamale expert, sold about 80 to 90 dozen tamales last holiday season. This year has been slower for her than others, but any amount of sales works for her.
She moved to Tulsa almost nine years ago and has sold tamales ever since. There weren’t many people selling in the area around that time, so she and her husband decided to jump into the business.
They stop at Walmart parking lots and local bars with their usual customers and any new ones that come.
“It’s like we’re a metro bus from Tulsa that stops at every corner and then the next one,” she said.
Daniela Zapata began selling tamales in 2022. She dropped the business, but earlier this year, someone asked her when she was planning to make them again.
She picked the dish back up and has made them frequently since the fall. She finds herself waking up early to prepare everything on a day she’s making batches. She works with her brother and cousin to complete orders to make them fresh each time.
“Tamales will always be part of us as Hispanics, as Latinos,” Zapata said. “It will always be something that in December, when it’s cold, we’re looking for them.”
Jaramillo remembers growing up in Matamoros, Mexico, and helping make tamales around the holiday season. Her least favorite part was covering the leaves with flour.
Her family would tell her to come over and cover the leaves in the early morning so the tamales could be ready to eat by Nochebuena, or Christmas Eve.
It’s still a family business for Ruiz, who can be found in the kitchen at TamaleBoyz preparing batches of tamales alongside her son, daughter-in-law and employee.
She’s always in charge of spreading the masa, or flour, on each tamale leaf. It takes her about 37 seconds each time.
“It’s something you can put anything you want in it and it’ll always come out right,” she said. “You can put whatever filling you want. As long as there’s love, it’ll come out right.”
Ruiz still isn’t tired of eating tamales. She plans to bring a few dozens to her own family celebration.
“Since I can remember, Christmas meant tamales,” she said. “Christmas comes with tamales and chocolate.”
This article was produced as part of a partnership between the Tulsa Flyer and La Semana, a Tulsa-based bilingual Spanish-English newspaper serving Latino communities in Oklahoma.
News decisions at the Tulsa Flyer are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
