Homemade Salsa

Restaurant-style Homemade Salsa recipe, ready in blender or food processor in few minutes. Warm corn tortilla chips, and fill a bowl of this refreshing red salsa because this party-perfect snack is calling "game day"! 

This Salsa recipe can be made ahead up-to a week. Make a double batch as it goes away fast. (recipe doubles easily) 

Let's make Salsa today! 

RESTAURANT-STYLE  RED SALSA

This salsa recipe is restaurant-style red salsa. The same salsa that is served table-side at most Mexican restaurants.

Refreshing Red Salsa and the fragrance of warm corn tortillas chips transport me to a local Mexican Restaurant in San Diego, CA. Their salsa and chips were my favorite. They serve a big bow of warm tortilla chips and two kind of salsa on-the-house - red salsa and white salsa. This recipe is my version of that red salsa for you. I hope to try and replicate their White Salsa some day and share with you.  

Oh, this reminds me. Recently, we found one new local Mexican restaurant in Bay Area (our new home town). they have a Salsa Bar! Every-time, I go there, I'm eating salsa chip-full to understand the taste.  So that I can share new recipes with you. A lot more Salsa to make to CDH. Stay tuned!

HOW TO MAKE SALSA?

Making a good restaurant-style salsa at home is very easy. All you need is a blender or food processor, and quintessential pantry-staple salsa ingredients.

1. Peeled Tomatoes packed in juice.
2. White Onion
3. Garlic
4. Cilantro
5. Jalapeno
6. Lime Juice
7. Vinegar
8. Seasoning
9. Cumin (my secret ingredient)

Add these ingredients (as detailed in Recipe Card) in blender or food processor, pulse until coarsely processed. Adjust seasoning to taste and you have it. The best salsa ever!

A good salsa is all about the right balance of salt, sour, heat and flavor. To achieve this balance of flavor, I make few changes to salsa:

1. Using canned tomatoes instead of fresh. Canned peeled tomatoes with juice give amazing depth of flavor to salsa. 
2. Use White Onion instead of red. Red onion are very sharp. White onion are mild and add just right amount of onion flavor without sharpness of red onion.
3. Toasted Cumin Powder. This ingredient you will not find in any other recipe. Freshly toasted cumin seeds powder give salsa a depth of flavor you will not find in store-bought salsa.

SALSA HEAT

This Salsa recipe is mild-medium heat salsa. But you can control the heat in salsa with adjustment of one ingredient i.e. Chili Pepper. Chili peppers are the signature flavor and quintessential ingredient of a Mexican Salsa recipe. Peppers such as Jalapeno, Serrano, Chipotle add flavor and heat to the salsa. I have used Jalapeno in this recipe without seeds which adds just right amount of pepper flavor and heat. Serrano is hotter than Jalapeno. 

Chipotle has mild heat and smokey flavor. If you like heat and smoky salsa, try my Hot Chipotle Salsa recipe. Or try my mild fresh ingredient salsa Pico De Gallo recipe.

You can also make this low or high in heat with adjustment of amount and kind of chili pepper. I recommend:

1. Medium Heat - 1 Jalapeno, seedless
2. Medium-high - 1 Serrano with seeds
3. High Heat - 2 Serrano or 1 Jalapeno and 1 Serrano

RED ONION vs WHITE ONION

Any day I'll prefer Red Onion in my salsa over white onion. But for quick salsa such as this Blender Salsa, red onion makes it very sharp. White Onion is a mild onion and it does not overpower the freshness of salsa. So I recommend stick to recipe ingredients and use white onion or check-out following tips to use red onion.

To use Red Onion, you can either: 
a) Small dice red onion and add to salsa after blender it. Refrigerate for at-least 30 minutes for onion to mellow-down and flavor to marry.
b) Or Add only a tbsp of red onion instead of 1/4 of onion. Add to blender after salsa has been blender. Quick pulse to combine. Refrigerate for at-least 30 minutes for onion to mellow-down and flavor to marry. 

Note: If using yellow onion, omit sugar used in recipe. 

Friends, chips and salsa are made for each other. Make a double batch of salsa at home (recipe doubles easily). Bring corn tortillas chips and enjoy Super Bowl game on 3rd February. 

49ers vs Chiefs!! Who do you think is going to take home the Super Bowl? 

Oh, and don't forget to warm the chips in microwave/oven for best chips and salsa experience ever!