Steve Harvey's Epic El Paso Tamal Fiasco

Photo byThe Official Steve Harvey Youtube

Back before Steve Harvey became the ubiquitous TV personality that he is now he was a struggling stand-up comic making the comedy club rounds.

One stop on his climb to the top was the West Texas town of El Paso where Harvey had a laugh-out-loud moment with a Mexican food staple.

Steve Harvey’s Hilarious Account of His El Paso Tamal Misadventure

Remember when you didn’t know what a tamal was or how to eat one? Yeah, neither can I.

But I was born and raised in South Texas and I’ve lived in El Paso for over 30 years so I’m very familiar with Tex-Mex and other traditional Mexican dishes.

Steve Harvey, however, was 28 years old the first time he had a tamal, because as he told his Family Feud audience, “I'm from the hood... Cleveland. There wasn't any Mexican food.”

In fact, the very first time he even tried Mexican food was before a comedy show in El Paso sometime in the mid-80s, and his first foray with the cuisine was like a culinary blind date gone wrong.

Photo byThe Official Steve Harvey Youtube

“I’m in El Paso, Texas and walked from the condo down to this Mexican restaurant,” Harvey recounts on an episode of his web series "Rollin’ with Steve Harvey," a behind the scenes look at his interaction with the studio audience in between filming segments of the game show.

“So, I open up the menu and I don’t recognize nothing, you know. I don’t know what an enchilada is, it’s just Q’s and U’s,”

He then related to the crowd that he ordered tamales and when the plate arrived, “I got the knife and fork and I start cutting it.” But he had a hard time swallowing it, much to the horror of a nearby local patron.

“Mexican dude sitting next to me, he said, ‘hey homes, what the f*** are you doing?” Steve continues. “You’re eating too much. You’re supposed to unwrap it first.’”

Yup, Steve dived right in without removing the corn husk first. Talk about a facepalm moment.

He never said if he liked the dish, but since the tamal in question was in El Paso it was probably pretty good – even with the corn husk!

Oh, and Steve, if you’re ever back in the Sun City and decide to buy chorizo at the grocery store, F.Y.I., you don’t squeeze it out and eat it like a tube of Go-Gurt.

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