We have friends who are from El Salvador and I try to honor them with indigenous foods of their land. This is particularly true when they return from an infrequent visit to their homeland. Thanks to the internet I found a traditional recipe for a turkey sandwich. Because we get an annual gift package of homemade tamales at Christmas I decided to take this as a hint.

I don't do tamales. Did once and too much work. So I do tamale "pie". I buy prepared tamale masa from a local Latina market. I add chopped Ortega chilies, spices and an equal amount of cooked rice. This is the crust.

I layer the prepared masa with a layer of turkey meat mixture.

The turkey meat is "pulled" turkey thighs with spices. The key spice is ACHIOTE an annatto seed seasoning. It was a hit and may sound a demise of labor intensive tamale preparations in their home.