Tired Of Turkey Sandwiches? Turn Thanksgiving Leftovers Into Tamales Instead

While everyone has their favorite Thanksgiving sides and desserts, everything revolves around the turkey. In fact, many of us make one for dinner and another for those coveted leftovers. Sandwiches are the go-to meal to repurpose turkey, but we can think of more creative and delicious recipes to try. We've consulted Rick Martinez, a James Beard Award-winning Mexican American chef, recipe developer, and author of the upcoming "Salsa Daddy" cookbook, who thinks that turkey tamales are the turkey sandwich alternative that you should try.

In Mexico, tamales are considered a Christmas-time food, which comes right on the heels of Thanksgiving — so turkey can become the Christmas gift to fuel your Thanksgiving gratitude. Steamed corn masa dumplings will bring a moist, earthy complement to dry, gamey turkey meat. Plus, according to Chef Martinez, turkey isn't the only Thanksgiving recipe you can incorporate into a tamale; "I think you could probably even just kind of flatten out your stuffing, especially if it's a cornbread dressing, and then use that as a masa."

The masa used to make traditional tamales is simply ground nixtamalized corn blended with liquid and fat. Cornbread dressing, with its spices and aromatics, would make a much more complex tamale shell. Should you need extra moisture to form the dressing into masa, you can add a bit of melted butter and turkey stock.

Chef Martinez loves tamales, as evidenced by the unique sweet-and-savory recipes he shares on his Instagram page. Coincidentally, he also shares a delicious cornbread and butternut squash dressing. You can certainly use Chef Martinez's recipes as inspiration, but any cornbread dressing will taste delicious with turkey in a tamale. We have a cornbread stuffing recipe, compliments of chef Rob Newton, with sage and bacon for you to try as well.

If you don't have any leftover dressing, you can still bring Thanksgiving flavors to corn masa by using turkey stock and butter as the liquid ingredients. You can also bring Mexican flavors to your turkey tamales by pairing your shredded turkey filling with a salsa or transforming the turkey into its own guisado or stewed tamale stuffing. For example, you could spoon some sweet and smoky roasted tomatillo salsa into your tamale with the turkey. You could also swap shredded chicken for turkey in this slow cooker Mexican chicken tinga recipe for a sweet, spicy chipotle-flavored turkey tamale. For an even easier swap, use shredded turkey instead of chicken in our recipe for chicken and poblano tamales. Turkey mole would be another ultra-rich and complex tamale filling.