I don’t watch a lot of television, but when I do, I naturally gravitate toward the Food Network. And, unashamedly so, two of my favorite shows are Chopped and Iron Chef. I just so happened to be watching Bobby Flay competing on Iron Chef last Sunday, and noticed that he had four or five blenders filled with different combinations of vegatables and what not to be pureed into sauces.
Since I was planning on making tacos some time soon (which happened to be yesterday), I decided to give this technique a try. Also, I just so happened to have the luck of having a roommate who recently took up gardening, so I had all of these peppers hanging around fresh on my balcony. “Fresher is better” and all that.
Ingredients
- 3 roma tomatoes
- 3 jalepeños
- 3 banana chiles
- 3 Anaheim chiles
- 2 limes
- 1 lemon
- 1 tbps. extra virgin olive oil
Remove the tops of the tomatoes, quarter and add to blender. Add the juice of the lemon and limes.
In a small pan over medium-high heat, add the olive oil and peppers. Toss till well coated. Roast until the chiles begin to blacken on each side. Turn with tongs to get an even roasting. Be careful not to burn them as you don’t want flaky bits of ash in your salsa. The entire process takes about 7-10 minutes.
Once roasted, remove the chiles from the pan and place on a cutting board to cool. Do not rinse or wipe them down. Once you are able to handle them, remove the stems. Leaving the seeds in while provide more spice,but if you or your guests can’t handle the heat, deseed them as well. The chiles should be very tender, and able to be quickly deseeded with a quick scrape of a spoon.
Add the prepared chiles to the blender and puree until liquefied.
Spicy to the lips and sweet to the palate. Makes about 2 1/2 cups.
Tags: anaheim chiles, banana chiles, banana peppers, extra virgin olive oil, jalepenos, lemon, lime, puree, roasted chiles, roasted peppers, salsa, sauce, tomato