Grocery Store's Spoiled Masa Ruins Traditional Tamale Christmas Dinners In Downey

DOWNEY (CBSLA.com) — A lot of people who bought tamales from a Downey market say this Christmas will be unforgettable for all the wrong reasons.

Angry customers are leaving their tamales at the doors of Amapola grocery store to try and get answers or their money back.  Many claim the masa to make the tamales was bad, leaving them no food on their Christmas dinner table. Some even say they got sick.

A store spokesman announced Sunday evening it will be offering refunds to customers.

"We had people over, there was a lot of people that ate them," Laura Andalon said. "And my daughters also got sick and were throwing up and we didn't even get to eat anything."

The grocery store has four locations in the Los Angeles area and thousands of tamales were sold before the holidays.

"My grandmother was depressed crying last night because she didn't have anything to feed us with. A sad Christmas actually," one customer said.

Some customers took to social media to express their frustrations and posted pictures of their rotten tamales.