Fresh Homemade Salsa

[FeyLady68]

Since I've been meaning to post some of my favorite recipes... and we've been talking love of corn dogs on another thread... :crazy: I'll post now one of my favorite delicious and super healthy recipes.

Fresh Salsa

(These measurements make a really big batch to serve 5 people, if you want to make less just use half of the amounts to feed 2 to 3 salsa loving people.)

This is really easy to make as long as you have a food processor and people will be impressed... if you don't have a good food processor it comes out nearly as good using a decent blender.

It's almost impossible to mess this recipe up, you just grind the ingredients all up together and if you don't like it spicy just leave out the spicy ingredients. (We like it spicy at my house. :hungry: )


Here's what you'll need for a big batch for 5 people:

8 fairly large tomatoes (I tend to see whatever tomatoes look good at the market and get a combination of different types of tomatoes which adds complexity to the flavor of the finished salsa. (The last batch of salsa I made was with 4 "big beauties" and 6 of the smaller "Roma" tomatoes and it was delicious.)

1 large/regular sized onion (I usually use yellow onion for this)

1 entire regular sized bulb of garlic

A quarter or half package of fresh cilantro (I consider this a key ingredient and it really makes it good unless you're one of those people who just doesn't like cilantro, if that's the case just use some other fresh herb you enjoy like parsley instead.)

3 or 4 fresh jalepenos OR you can use 2 and a half to 3 teaspoons of jalepenos from a jar OR tabasco type liquid jalepeno sauce. If you love spicy salsa you can also add a few drops of red pepper oil of any kind. (The last batch I made, I used 3 teaspoons of the jalepenos from a jar and it came out great.)

1 tablespoon of liquid smoke flavoring (optional, but adds a nice flavor)

1 teaspoon of salt


That's it!

To assemble: My food processor isn't big enough to hold this much so I have to blend it in small batches and then pour the small batches into a big tupperware type container and stir it all up with a spoon. Prep the onions and garlic by removing all the papery outer layers and chopping them up a little and chop the tomatoes up a little bit too before blending, this way the processor has an easier time blending smooth without big lumpy bits. Pulse your food processor or blender to blend each portion. It doesn't matter what order you put the things in, just blend everything up fairly fine and then stir it all together in some type of sealable tupperware container. If you like a chunkier salsa you can pulse some of it less and blend some of it a little more to make a nice mix of chunky in with the smooth. I tend to just blend it all pretty fine.

Once you have it all blended together you can just stick in in the fridge for the flavors to marry for a few hours and it's great as is. Or some people like to simmer it on the stove, only very slightly which makes a sweeter/mellow type of salsa rather than spicy/fresh tasting type of salsa. At my house we like to eat it the spicy/fresh way not simmered and it is a bit healthier for you that way being that everything in it is raw that way.

The finished salsa is great for all sorts of recipes: you can use it on toasted french bread to make something like bruschetta... or use it as a base in melty nachos with sour cream... or just eat it on corn chips.

Enjoy! :hungry: :cloud9:

[FeyLady68]

Oh PS, one more thing just if you use the fresh jalepenos be sure to put on some plastic gloves and core them first and only use the flesh not the seeds or that really will be some spicy salsa haha. For this recipe I usually use the ones from a jar instead just because it's quicker and easier that way.

(Even though I do have some great jalepeno recipes using the real peppers too if any of you are so inclined.) :devil:

[Ellegria*]

Yummers....thanks!

[dawnandziggy]

that makes me soooooo hungry :hungry: thanks for sharing and wish you could send some overalready made