Abby here.
We have reached that glorious time in the summer where we have more tomatoes than we know what to do with.
I’ve made a few batches of Jeanne’s tomato sauce for pizzas, we’ve had more than one caprese salad and of course, salsa. Last year I posted this easy raw garden salsa, but I wanted to attempt a fire-roasted version to copy my absolute favorite locally sold salsa, Montana Mex. If you can get your hands on that stuff you won’t regret it!
This is one of those recipes that the ingredients don’t have to be exact, and you can sort of throw in what you want. I kept it simple with ingredients straight from our garden: tomatoes, green pepper, jalapeno, onion and garlic, but you could add in chilis, lime, chili powder, cilantro, etc.
Seeing I love any and all mexican food, my quart size batch we made yesterday is almost gone. Oops.
Here’s what I used:
- 4(ish) pounds of red tomatoes
- 1 green pepper
- 1 red jalapeno (seeds removed)
- 1 white onion
- 1 clove of garlic
- salt to taste
- griddle over stove or a hot grill
- food processor
On a hot griddle or grill, lay out the veggies (I know, I know… tomatoes are technically fruit) and char both sides for about 2 minutes each. I think a grill would be best, but I didn’t want to fire up the coals mid-day just for a batch of salsa. The over the stove solution worked just fine.
Remove the veggies from heat and place everything except tomatoes in a food processor. (I save the tomatoes for the end to keep everything from getting too runny.) Pulse veggies a few times until everything is roughly chopped, and then add tomatoes and salt (I started with 1/2 tsp) and pulse again you reach your desired consistency. I’m a chunky kind of girl.
This yielded about a quart, and as I said… it didn’t last too long. If you had more self-control than me it would probably last a solid week in the fridge.
P.S. Promise me you won’t touch your eyes for a long, long time after removing the jalepeno seeds. YOWZERS it still burns!
