fresh roasted tomato salsa
Chips and salsa. One of the best food combinations out there. Thinking of them immediately conjures up memories of summer vacations near a lake or near a pool. Warm weather, light lunches that consist of snack type foods like this. It seems that salsa shines in the summer, but it’s not just a summer thing. Most of us love visiting Mexican restaurants and devouring the free chips and salsa. Taco night can be a summer dinner or a winter dinner. Maybe the summer version of taco night features grilled steak or other grilled meats. And the winter version features braised meats. Taco nights are always trending.
This past year, we visited my best friend and her family in Texas. One of their favorite tacos is lengua. They have a gas station / convenience store locally that serves amazing tacos, with lengua being one of the stars. So she decided to make lengua tacos one of the nights we were with them, and went all out with homemade salsas, guacamole, we even made homemade corn tortillas together. It’s one of the things we love doing together – preparing food and enjoying the feast together. The more effort that goes into it, the more rewarding it is. The salsa she made is one of those recipes that is a forever recipe. It’ll be the recipe I go to when I want homemade salsa. And frankly, it’s so easy and so fresh that I’m not sure why I would buy jarred salsa instead.
I’m consciously realizing that I’ve long been on a personal search for really good homemade salsa. I can recall making salsas from the cookbook of a local Mexican restaurant with this same friend in High School. I’ve made many salsa verdes, roasting tomatillos, onions, and jalapeños. Those have their place. But sometimes you just need a solid tomato salsa. Pico de Gallo is amazing – and on many occasions, I’d pick Pico over salsa, but sometimes you just need a solid salsa to satisfy. Sometimes, I crave a roasted tomato flavor and don’t want everything to be raw. And yet, the canned tomatoes that are cooked, just don’t quite do it. They’re a bit lacking in flavor for this use.
This recipe is that. It hits on the roasted tomato flavor, it’s easy to make, the roasted garlic is a distinct flavor, and it’s very easy to adjust the heat level (mild, medium, hot) by adjusting the number of serrano peppers you use and whether you remove or keep the seeds. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do, and as always, please share if you’ve come across great salsa recipes of any type – fresh, green, hot, mild, roasted, and raw. There is never one salsa to rule them all – there’s a place for variety of flavor and style, always!
Fresh Roasted Tomato Salsa
If you're looking for an easy homemade salsa that's fresh, has roasted tomatoes and is easy to adjust the heat level, this is it!
Ingredients
- 6 Roma tomatoes, cut in half lengthwise
- 1 yellow or sweet onion, cut in half lengthwise
- 3 Serrano peppers, stemmed and seeded (for mild heat)
- 4-5 cloves of garlic
- 1/2 TSP salt
- 3/4 bunch of cilantro
Instructions
Preheat oven to 375F. Arrange the tomatoes and onion cut side up on a baking sheet lined with parchment. Add the peppers and garlic to the baking sheet. Roast until the everything looks cooked through and has developed a nice char - about 40-45 minutes. Use the broil setting, if needed to develop extra char.
Remove from the oven and let cool a bit. Process in a food processor along with the salt and cilantro. That's it! Enjoy.
Notes
Inspired by: My dear friend and One Particular Kitchen