Tamal vs. Tamale

I was at the airport in LAX and I needed something to eat. There was a Mexican restaurant so I ate there, since I don't get Mexican food that often. I looked at their menu and decided to order their "tamale and enchilada" combo, when I realized that tamale is not the correct Spanish word. It should be spelled "tamal." Of course, I knew the Mexican servers at the counter knew this. So when ordering the food, I couldn't decide whether to say "tamale" or "tamal." On the one hand, tamal is correct, but on the other hand maybe I shouldn't be pretending to speak Spanish, and recognize the correct English translation as "tamale." In the end I asked for tamale, since I didn't want to act like a know-it-all. What do u think, my loyal readers, did I do the right thing?