I’m a big fan of salsa. Over the last 20 years or so I’ve put it on everything from chips to peanut butter, and I’ve tried dozens of varieties. My personal favorite is a freshly cut kind using very ripe tomatoes, onions, tons of cilantro, your favorite capsaicin carrier, and a dash of lime. Mmm mmm.
Over the years, however, I’ve come to an important realization about this spicy little delight: I hate BAD salsa. It took me a while to come to terms with this, but the hard reality is that not all salsa is created equal. And try as we might to make our own, or only buy quality kinds, we all will eventually end up with a jar of red sauce in our fridge that has ’salsa’ (or worse yet, ‘picante’) on the label, but that in reality bears little resemblance to that perfect blend of tang and spice that we’ve come to know and love.
This can happen for a variety of reasons. Perhaps it was left behind by someone who brought it to the last party you hosted, or perhaps your significant other bought it without considering your salsa standards. Whatever the reason, it tastes like someone cooked onions in a pressure cooker for three days and dumped them in a pile of tomato sauce. Not exactly what I want to water log my chips in.
But have no fear! There is a solution, and it’s easier than you might think. Just last week I was in this same kind of situation. A jar of non-descript tomato based blandness made it’s way into my fridge and it’s the dead of winter in Wisconsin right now so I don’t exactly have the option of fresh tomatoes.
So let’s start by analyzing the problems with bad salsa:
- Texture. Everything is so over-cooked and over mixed that it’s just mush. Sometimes it’s slightly lumpy mush, but it has no chunk, no crisp, no snap.
- Flavor. The spice (meaning both flavor and heat) is either mostly gone from over cooking, or never present to begin with because of trying to cater to a wide consumer audience by using a shamefully simple flavor profile.
- Heat. Even the hot stuff isn’t. Granted, I know that there are local varieties or specialty brands that do better on this front, but the big names that you always associate with salsas just never bring any kick to the party
- Color. It’s all red. There might be some hints of something green that now just looks wilted and brown, or some transparent bits that are supposed to pass for onions, but salsa should look like a fresh garden, not something a rabbit regurgitated.
Before we begin, first a ground rule: USE FRESH INGREDIENTS FOR THIS! I can’t emphasize this enough. The whole point is to bring life to this dead dish, you’re just not going to pull that off by using dried, powered, or otherwise ruined ingredients. But take note, there is a very big exception to that rule when it comes to tomatoes. I don’t know what it’s like in other parts of the world, but in North America there’s only a few months when you can get a truly get a vine ripe tomato. The rest of the year they are picked green and shipped around to ripen in the truck. The problem is that most of the flavor happens in the final stages of ripening. For sauces like salsa or spaghetti sauce, you can actually get a better flavor using cans than with fresh tomatoes if said tomatoes are that distinct milky pink color instead of ripe red.
So, what’s the action plan? Let’s start at the top. We’re going to add texture back into the mix by adding in some fresh ingrediants again! Just treat what’s in the jar like a tomato sauce that you’re going to turn into salsa. Chop up some yellow onion dump it right in. If you like green or red peppers chop some up and put those in too. And lastly put in some chuncks of tomatoe. Either diced from a can and drained, or a vine ripe chopped. Instant texture. Just give that a little stir and you’re already going to like it better.
Next we want to add to the flavor. What we just put in will help a lot, but your next step is going to put it over the top: fresh cilantro. If you’re not familiar with this beautiful herb, then you should be. I always have some of this in my fridge. I buy it in bundles and put it stems down in a water filled container in my fridge. Keeps pretty well that way. Get a bunch and chop it up fine to add to your salsa mix. I’m not going to give you a measurement (I’ll let you figure that out on your own) but personally, I like copious amounts. Top it off with some freshly ground pepper, a good dash of lemon and/or lime juice, and depending on the sodium level of your salsa base, some kosher salt. Now the flavor is really starting to zing! Pay attention to the balance of acid and salt. You might fine that adding a pinch of sugar (and I mean a pinch, don’t over-do this) could really bring out the flavor if things are out of balance.
Third we need to kick up the heat. You can use just about anything you like to add heat to this, but whatever you do, do NOT use green picked jalapenos from a can! Those monstrosities are worth a whole post, but I’ll digress for now. Remember our ground rules! We only do fresh here. One or two fresh hot peppers finely chopped, and as many seeds as you can stand will work nicely, or something like cayenne powder will work too.
Once that’s completed you’ll be happy to see that our fourth point, color, has already taken care of itself! Step back and revel in the amazing creation you have made. You’d find that not only is it better than anything you’ll ever find in a jar, but it’s close enough to fresh salsa to tide you over for winter. Enjoy!