Thursday, June 17, 2010

Salsa recipe

After studying the salsa at Maria's and a few practice rounds, I think I've come up with a pretty darn good salsa recipe. I put in the ingredients kind of by feel, so I don't have any measurements here...just use common cooking sense and it will be good :)

The salsa takes all of the following:
Stewed tomatoes (Great Value stewed tomatoes from Walmart work great)
Onion
Garlic
Cilantro
Celery
Bell Pepper
Cumin
Paprika
Pickled Jalepenos
Vinegar
Salt
Lime

Strain the stewed tomatoes the best you can - the less liquid you have in them, the better. Mince up your onion, garlic, cilantro, celery, and bell pepper as fine as you can. The total of your bell pepper, celery, and garlic should be less than the total of your onion. Bell pepper and celery are mainly for color and texture, so keep that in mind - don't want to over-do it or you might get weird flavors. You want a light sprinking of salt, cumin, and paprika. It's easy to over-do the salt. Put in just a dash of vinegar to get a little extra tang. It's easy to over-do the lime too. You might want to go with the juice of about 1/3 of a lime for every two cans of tomatoes. Get all of the ingredients listed above together in a blender, then blend it slowly. Don't do it too long because you don't want a salsa smoothie. At this point I put the salsa in a pan to simmer for a while to help soften up the onion, bell pepper, and celery and get the flavors to mix, but this part may not be necessary.

Once you're done with all of this, if you're feeling adventurous you could throw in some corn and/or beans to add to the mix.

Put it in the refrigerator for a while to cool down, then you're ready for chips and salsa.