Had to look up where Brawley is. Gonna remember that and if I'm ever near the Salton Sea, I'll try them out.

Two great places come to mind for me:

- Street Cravings food truck, Sacramento. Efram doesn't make them often, but they are phenomenal when he does.

- Lucy's Tamale Factory, Watsonville. Always fresh, always excellent.

Yep middle of nowhere. They are excellent. Well balanced filling to masa ratio. Very moist and each one had a black olive. Very good salsa as well.

You'd think that getting the ratio right and the moisture would be easy, seems they aren't. Any road I travel out of town I can hit at least 1-2 farm fruit & produce stands within minutes, every one of them sells tamales. Most are a bit on the soggy side. One place even keeps them prepacked in ziploc bags (wtf).

One pass I'll give on the ratio is that there is a churro vendor at the farmers market and some of our brewery big events here who sometimes has tamales, when they do, I'll buy the heck out of them. Usually I'll just ask them if they can make up a tray and I'll come back in a few hours to pick it up. Their ratio is never consistent, but they have a small army of Abuelas on standby to restock on demand. So, ratio be dammed, these are right out of the steamer.

Oh sh*t, those were some bomb azz tamales... they were the tamales that all other tamales have been judged in my life.