Tamale making is pretty much an all day affair here, but a labor of love.
You could go high end:

http://homecooking.about.com/od/shel...r/blsea179.htm

Pulled pork is a good compromise:

http://bbq.about.com/od/porkrecipes/r/bl070228a.htm

Christmas tamales would certainly be appropriate:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...95/ai_17963570

Usually, my daughters are home for Christmas. If I
make the filling ahead of time, getting them and a few friends over for the
filling of the corn husks, shaping, and steaming is a fun event with a lot
of kitchen banter and holiday socializing.

Tom

"zxcvbob" > wrote in message
...
> It's almost tamale season, and for several years I've wanted to try making
> homemade tamales but never got around to it -- probably because I'm
> intimidated a little by them. This year I think I'm gonna go for it. I
> have the corn shucks already, and several quarts of goose fat in the
> freezer that needs to be used for *something* before it goes off (I'll use
> it instead of lard because decent lard is very hard to find.)
>
> Should I make chicken or turkey or pork tamales? Besides the shredded
> meat, what else goes in the middles? I've seen recipes that call for
> raisins and weird stuff like that, but I think that's more an Oaxaca thing
> than what I want. I'll probably make them pretty hot, so I was thinking
> of using a little dehydrated onions and garlic, and a mixture of canned
> chipotles in adobo and reconstituted dried ancho peppers. Or maybe
> guajillo or pulla peppers instead of the anchos...
>
> Has anyone here done this before?
>
> When the Mexicans I work with (remotely, from Guadalajara) find out about
> this, I'll never hear the end of it. :-)
>
> Bob