The lid on my last quart jar of salsa, 2007 vintage, cracked its seal with a pop as I spun the ring off, filling my kitchen with the fragrant fumes of last year’s produce.
My mouth began to sweat as the pungent peppers and onions announced their presence to my entire house.
Salsa has been a staple in my family’s pantry as far back as I can remember.
I can recall vivid images of my mother stewing tomatoes and onions in the kitchen for hours as I stared eagerly, chips in hand, awaiting the vine-ripened, vinegary goodness.
She would carefully scald the tomatoes in small batches of boiling water allowing the skins to slip off.
Next came piles of diced onions, peppers and dry spices.
That specific recipe was from a neighbor and good friend, Teresa Dietz, who was good enough to supply the recipe and the tomatoes each year.
As I learned to cook the salsa my mother made, the next logical step was to grow the produce myself.
I began growing peppers, onions and tomatoes at 12 in my neighbor’s back lot and continued at the rent homes I occupied through college.
I experimented with recipe after recipe searching for perfection and even went so far as to work in two local Mexican restaurants whose cooked salsa and relishes were great—I’ll leave the name of the restaurant out and include a salsa recipe!
I’ve learned over the years there is no best salsa, but there are different categories of the delicious dip that needn’t be compared against each other; namely cooked salsas, fresh salsas and picos de gallo.
Pico de gallo (Spanish for ‘beak of the rooster’) is a coarse, Mexican-style relish that can be added to chili, mixed with other salsas or simply rolled up in a warm tortilla.
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