Tamale King

I got a girl, say she long and tall,
Sleeps in the kitchen with her feets in the hall.
Hot tamales and they red hot, yes, she got ’em for sale, I mean,
Yes, she got ’em for sale, yeah.
— From “They’re Red Hot” by Delta bluesman Robert Johnson

Jackson is hungry for tamales. Three businesses listed in the 2002 Jackson BellSouth Yellow Pages have the word “tamales” in their name (Tony’s Tamales, 2325 Livingston Rd.; Jack’s Tamales, 1056 Old Brandon Rd., Flowood; and Jose’s Tamales, 136 South Pearson Rd., Pearl). And scores of restaurants, Mexican and otherwise, have tamales on their menus. They’re also sold at bars, pool halls and convenience stores in and around Jackson.

Juan Mora, a Mexican immigrant who got his start selling homemade tamales from a cart on Downtown streets, opened the Big Apple Inn (also known as Big John’s) at 509 North Farish St. back in 1939. Jack’s Tamales opened in 1972. But Tony Mosley, 53, takes full credit for Jackson’s current hunger for tamales. “Everybody got the idea from me,” Mosley says. “When I first started there was two (tamale) places, Jack’s and Big John’s.”

Mosley has been making and selling them for 20 years, the last 18 out of his store, Tony’s Tamales, across the street from the Jackson Medical Mall. He has also carved a tasty niche for himself selling tamales to businesses including Hal & Mal’s and The Boardwalk pool hall.

How many tamales did Tony’s sell in 2001? “A lot.” Thanks to his success, Mosley says, “the word started getting out, so every time you look around (now), somebody is selling them. People think it’s easy, but it’s a lot of work.”

Mosley says making tamales is a two-day process. On the first day, the meat (Tony’s uses beef) and cornmeal are cooked separately, then chilled. On the second day, the meat and meal are put in a tamale-making machine that puts the beef inside the cornmeal and cuts the tamales to length. Then the tamales are wrapped by hand in cornhusks. Tony’s offers two flavors of beef tamales, hot and mild.

Tony’s usually cooks tamales three days a week (the store is open every day but Sunday), and Mosley says the store makes 200 dozen each time. That adds up to 7,200 tamales a week.

The tamale came to the Delta in the early 1900s, brought by Mexican migrant workers who came up from Texas to pick the crops, and quickly became a staple. Before hamburger chains arrived in the 1960s and ’70s, the tamale was probably the most popular fast food in the area. There are still tamale stands along highways there.

“Tamales became very much a Delta food,” Greenville native and author Shelby Foote once said. “Hell, we were eating them before I ever recall seeing a Mexican.”

Like Foote, Mosley is a Greenville native. “I been eatin’ ’em all my life.” Mosley says.

Mosley doesn’t know the history of the tamale in Mississippi. As for why tamales were so popular in his hometown, Mosley says, “My mama said because it was a poor city.”

Before he started making tamales in 1982, Mosley worked at hospitals in Greenville and Jackson, and also drove a mail truck. Why get into the tamale business? “I was looking for a job. I needed the work.”

Mosley makes his tamales in a fortress-like metal building that sits between a pawn shop and an abandoned Burger King. There are bars on the front window, and a high fence topped with razor wire surrounds three sides of the building and part of the lot. The place could be mistaken for an auto lot at first glance; there are enough cars parked in the lot to stock a small used-car dealership. Indeed, at second glance, I see that the back half of the building is a used-car dealership. Mosley says the only connection between the businesses is the building they share.

Customers can dine in or carry out, but seating in Tony’s small shop is limited to four seats at a wooden bar and a pair of tables for two. If you don’t want tamales, Tony’s also sells hot wings, hot dogs and chili.

Responding to recent tamale trends, Mosley has added bean tamales, red and black, to his menu. “You’ve got a lot of vegetarians now,” he says. He also makes venison tamales, but “you got to bring your own deer.”

Jack Leming is a writer in Jackson.