Not all of us are lucky enough to live near a local Mexican restaurant that serves great tamales, so we enlisted the help of Guerrilla Tacos owner Wesley Avila to show us how to make top-notch tamales at home.

Good news: it’s a much less daunting task then one would think. (Hint: Wes’s secret weapon is the microwave.) Wes also shows us how to make an accompanying salsa that’s so good, it should be bottled.

This first appeared on MUNCHIES in 2015.