Salsa troubleshooting
Discussion
Hello all,
Recently, a friend at work brought in some home made salsa for us to eat at work, and thinking it would be easy to copy, I had a go myself, I don't think I've quite nailed it yet though.
I got his recipe from him, he said its just a basic guide and that you can modify the quantities to suit your tastes and still get a good result. It is basically as follows;
3 onions
6 large tomatoes (I couldn't get large ones, so used 12 smaller ones)
3/4 of a cucumber
Whole chillis, to taste (he used one Scotch bonnet, I used 6 much weaker birdseye chillis)
a dressing of white vinegar and mint sauce in a 1:1 ratio, used sparingly.
He dices the whole lot with one of those JML nicer dicer things, adds the dressing, mixes through and then chills in the fridge before serving. It was delicious, super fresh tasting, had a nice spicey kick and a really fresh, Raita-esque flavour underneath. It was a total hit and we couldn't get enough of it.
I don't have a dicer and it would have taken all night to dice everything by hand, so I used a food processor. Unfortunately, to get everything homogenous, it had to be blended pretty fine, so it was already missing some of the chunky, crunchy texture of the original dish. After mixing everything, it seemed too wet - probably the bloody tomatoes, so I strained it through a sieve, pressing the excess moisture out, before putting it back into a bowl, which improved it enormously.
The thing that irks me is that the taste just isn't there. Mine just tastes a bit sour and earthy, and it's not spicey enough. I'm loathe to put in more Birdseye chillis, which aren't a great flavour of chilli to start with, incase it enhances the unwanted "earthy" taste it has at the moment. I've got it chilling in the fridge now, I'll try it later with some tortillas and see if it has matured and improved. If not, I'll mixing in a teaspoon of Blair's After Death sauce and shovel it down as cheap fodder. I bought all the produce fresh today, so it's not like I was using old crap I had kicking around in the fridge.
Can anyone offer any tips for getting a good salsa? Can anyone see anything I've done obviously wrong? I thought the recipe I was following pretty simple, and though I've never made salsa before, I was expecting to nail it first time!
Recently, a friend at work brought in some home made salsa for us to eat at work, and thinking it would be easy to copy, I had a go myself, I don't think I've quite nailed it yet though.
I got his recipe from him, he said its just a basic guide and that you can modify the quantities to suit your tastes and still get a good result. It is basically as follows;
3 onions
6 large tomatoes (I couldn't get large ones, so used 12 smaller ones)
3/4 of a cucumber
Whole chillis, to taste (he used one Scotch bonnet, I used 6 much weaker birdseye chillis)
a dressing of white vinegar and mint sauce in a 1:1 ratio, used sparingly.
He dices the whole lot with one of those JML nicer dicer things, adds the dressing, mixes through and then chills in the fridge before serving. It was delicious, super fresh tasting, had a nice spicey kick and a really fresh, Raita-esque flavour underneath. It was a total hit and we couldn't get enough of it.
I don't have a dicer and it would have taken all night to dice everything by hand, so I used a food processor. Unfortunately, to get everything homogenous, it had to be blended pretty fine, so it was already missing some of the chunky, crunchy texture of the original dish. After mixing everything, it seemed too wet - probably the bloody tomatoes, so I strained it through a sieve, pressing the excess moisture out, before putting it back into a bowl, which improved it enormously.
The thing that irks me is that the taste just isn't there. Mine just tastes a bit sour and earthy, and it's not spicey enough. I'm loathe to put in more Birdseye chillis, which aren't a great flavour of chilli to start with, incase it enhances the unwanted "earthy" taste it has at the moment. I've got it chilling in the fridge now, I'll try it later with some tortillas and see if it has matured and improved. If not, I'll mixing in a teaspoon of Blair's After Death sauce and shovel it down as cheap fodder. I bought all the produce fresh today, so it's not like I was using old crap I had kicking around in the fridge.
Can anyone offer any tips for getting a good salsa? Can anyone see anything I've done obviously wrong? I thought the recipe I was following pretty simple, and though I've never made salsa before, I was expecting to nail it first time!
As said, fresh coriander, red onion (or mild white onion) finely diced, deseeded tomatoes, bit of tom. puree, lime juice and chili, I use jalapeños. If pushing the boat out some chopped advacado.
If you are using cucumber deseed it first. Thats where most of the water and taste is coming from.
If you are using cucumber deseed it first. Thats where most of the water and taste is coming from.
vinegar and mint sauce? Not sure about that 
Lime juice and zest is all the acid/citrus component you need. Coriander leaf also as the chaps above said.
Salt is pretty important, probably a lot more than you'd think. Use a hefty pinch of salt to grind your garlic into a paste.
Unless you have spectactularly ripe and tasty tomatoes then a little sugar or even a dash of ketchup is allowed - the ones in latin American don't taste like the ones here!
A good pinch of ground cumin and the same of ground coriander is also good.
Lime juice and zest is all the acid/citrus component you need. Coriander leaf also as the chaps above said.
Salt is pretty important, probably a lot more than you'd think. Use a hefty pinch of salt to grind your garlic into a paste.
Unless you have spectactularly ripe and tasty tomatoes then a little sugar or even a dash of ketchup is allowed - the ones in latin American don't taste like the ones here!
A good pinch of ground cumin and the same of ground coriander is also good.
Shaw Tarse said:
Buy a decent knife?
To chop that amount of ingredients would take minutes.
I have two decent knife sets, unfortunately my knife skills are crap and I'd struggle to get them diced finely enough, or of an even size. Any tips or links to a good source to learn?To chop that amount of ingredients would take minutes.
Scotch bonnets would have been better than Birdeseyes I know, but I couldn't get SBs locally so had to make do. Birdeyes are good for heat but the flavour is not amazing imo, so I was not expecting them to add anything other than heat to the dish. An SB would have been better all round.
Vinegar and mint sauce - sounds a bit crude I know but trust me, the stuff my mate made tasted great, and it was a super simple recipe. I wanted something easy to make as it was my first go!
I did not deseed the cucumber, which combined with the brutal action of the food processor, probably released a lot of free water into the dish. Straining it did dry it out considerably, but it would probably have been better without it in the first place.
I did not add salt - forgot that, it was on my friend's recipe.
I think tomorrow night I will grind up some garlic and some rock salt and mix that in tomorrow, hopefully it will liven the taste up a bit. It's acceptable at the minute, but it's not exactly bursting with the flavour, whereas the one I tasted originally was.
Mastodon2 said:
I have two decent knife sets, unfortunately my knife skills are crap and I'd struggle to get them diced finely enough, or of an even size. Any tips or links to a good source to learn?
Scotch bonnets would have been better than Birdeseyes I know, but I couldn't get SBs locally so had to make do. Birdeyes are good for heat but the flavour is not amazing imo, so I was not expecting them to add anything other than heat to the dish. An SB would have been better all round.
Vinegar and mint sauce - sounds a bit crude I know but trust me, the stuff my mate made tasted great, and it was a super simple recipe. I wanted something easy to make as it was my first go!
I did not deseed the cucumber, which combined with the brutal action of the food processor, probably released a lot of free water into the dish. Straining it did dry it out considerably, but it would probably have been better without it in the first place.
I did not add salt - forgot that, it was on my friend's recipe.
I think tomorrow night I will grind up some garlic and some rock salt and mix that in tomorrow, hopefully it will liven the taste up a bit. It's acceptable at the minute, but it's not exactly bursting with the flavour, whereas the one I tasted originally was.
If not already done so, imagine you'll be wanting to deseed and skin the tomatoes, and use less of them.Scotch bonnets would have been better than Birdeseyes I know, but I couldn't get SBs locally so had to make do. Birdeyes are good for heat but the flavour is not amazing imo, so I was not expecting them to add anything other than heat to the dish. An SB would have been better all round.
Vinegar and mint sauce - sounds a bit crude I know but trust me, the stuff my mate made tasted great, and it was a super simple recipe. I wanted something easy to make as it was my first go!
I did not deseed the cucumber, which combined with the brutal action of the food processor, probably released a lot of free water into the dish. Straining it did dry it out considerably, but it would probably have been better without it in the first place.
I did not add salt - forgot that, it was on my friend's recipe.
I think tomorrow night I will grind up some garlic and some rock salt and mix that in tomorrow, hopefully it will liven the taste up a bit. It's acceptable at the minute, but it's not exactly bursting with the flavour, whereas the one I tasted originally was.
Also, a bag of onions cost about £1; so buy and practice your knife skills. Remember to sharpen your knives before use.
I did deseed the tomatoes, not sure of the best way to go about skinning them, any good ways to do it?
I put some salt in earlier and it's much, much improved. Can't believe I left out the bloody seasoning, duhhhh.
Next time I think I will use less tomato, probably 2 white onions and 1 red, deseed the cucumber and not forget the salt. I'll probably try slicing the lot up by hand too!
I put some salt in earlier and it's much, much improved. Can't believe I left out the bloody seasoning, duhhhh.
Next time I think I will use less tomato, probably 2 white onions and 1 red, deseed the cucumber and not forget the salt. I'll probably try slicing the lot up by hand too!
Remove the top of the core. Think a coutersunk screw in terms of depth.
Turn upside down and make a cross on the bottom of the tomato with a knife, just enough to pierce the skin, about the same size as what you would write on a gretting card.
Plunge into boiling water for 15-20 seconds
Remove and Plunge into Ice water.
Peel off skins from bottom where the cross you made is when cool enough to handle.
Voila.
Turn upside down and make a cross on the bottom of the tomato with a knife, just enough to pierce the skin, about the same size as what you would write on a gretting card.
Plunge into boiling water for 15-20 seconds
Remove and Plunge into Ice water.
Peel off skins from bottom where the cross you made is when cool enough to handle.
Voila.
lepetitoeuf said:
Your salsa recipe sounds very American, not how I'd make salsa normally.
I always do the same, not sure of quantities:
Main ingredient (tomato, mango, pineapple etc)
Red onion/spring onion
Fresh chilli
Lime juice
LOTS of coriander
Leave for a few hours to meld.
^^^ That's how I do it. I always do the same, not sure of quantities:
Main ingredient (tomato, mango, pineapple etc)
Red onion/spring onion
Fresh chilli
Lime juice
LOTS of coriander
Leave for a few hours to meld.
All chopped fine to somewhere in between 'Dolly Mixtures' and 'granulated sugar'.
I add a pinch of sugar if the tomatoes aren't particularly ripe, but I never skin them.
I've got a good salsa, might be an authentic gaucamole recipe I'm not sure. Anyway, ingredients:
- 3 ripe avacadoes
- 4 ripe, large toms
- Five spring onions, the white and some of the green only
- Two large garlic cloves
- Juice of 1 Lemon
- Large bunch of coriander
- 1 large red chilli (or more, to taste)
All you need to do is skin and de-seed the toms, then roughly chop with the rest of the ingredients. Finely chop the spring onion, garlic and chilli if you can. Then give it plenty of seasoning, and I mean plenty.
Key to this is to taste it - more lemon, salt, and even a teaspoon of sugar can lift it to your tastes. Really easy and I promise it is lovely
Just keep tasting and adjusting to how you like!
- 3 ripe avacadoes
- 4 ripe, large toms
- Five spring onions, the white and some of the green only
- Two large garlic cloves
- Juice of 1 Lemon
- Large bunch of coriander
- 1 large red chilli (or more, to taste)
All you need to do is skin and de-seed the toms, then roughly chop with the rest of the ingredients. Finely chop the spring onion, garlic and chilli if you can. Then give it plenty of seasoning, and I mean plenty.
Key to this is to taste it - more lemon, salt, and even a teaspoon of sugar can lift it to your tastes. Really easy and I promise it is lovely
Just keep tasting and adjusting to how you like!
Gassing Station | Food, Drink & Restaurants | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff