Adrienne’s Famous Bean Salsa

I’m not sure how long my sister-in-law, Adrienne, has been making this bean salsa for my family. I’ve been out of state for a while so I haven’t been savvy to who brings what side dishes to gatherings. But everyone in our family knows about it so it’s probably been a while.

All I know is that when hubby and I moved back to NY this summer, she invited us to join her and my brother at her parents’ cottage on the lake for an afternoon. We were sitting on the patio in the shade, watching boats go by and sipping cold beer. Hubby and I had just eaten lunch so we weren’t particularly hungry, and we pretty much ignored the bean salsa that was sitting on the table. For a little whole.

Then, during a lull in the conversation, I picked up a tortilla chip and scooped some out.

Then I couldn’t stop, even though I was full. So nummy. Scoop after scoop.

Afterwards, I wanted it again, but didn’t want to make it just for hubby and I because I knew that it makes a lot. And it’s one of those recipes that’s very difficult to halve because you’re using a can of beans here, a can of corn there, an envelope of seasoning there, etc.

But then Adrienne invited some people over. Now was my chance! It’s a little silly to bring over someone’s own recipe, but I did it anyway.

Here are my ingredients:

Start with the green bell pepper.

Dice it up, and then do the same with a sweet onion.

And then a couple tomatoes.

Next, open up cans of black beans, black eyed peas, and corn. Drain and rinse, then add to the diced veggies.

Then take a tablespoon of minced garlic. This took me forever to prepare, peeling and mincing a ton of small cloves. Better than the stuff from a jar, though.

Plop it on top of everything else.

Oh, and then cut open a lime

And squeeze it over the whole thing.

Now for some seasonings… Oregano…

Basil (from the tube in my fridge)…

And cilantro (also from a tube).

Finally, in a little bowl, combine some olive oil…

and vinegar (I wasn’t sure what kind, so I used white wine vinegar)…

and a packet of Italian dressing mix.

Mix it up, and pour on top of the salsa!

And with that, you’re done!

Chill it for a few hours, then serve with tortilla chips.

It’s so addicting. Seriously. The dressing mix tenderizes the veggies and makes such a delicious flavor. You’re supposed to drain before serving, but I happen to love the Italian dressing/ veggie juice mixture sitting at the bottom of the bowl, so I didn’t.

So when can I have this again?

Stuffed Peppers, Third Attempt

I feel like I owe an apology to Gina at skinnytaste.com. I tried her recipe for turkey stuffed peppers, using ground beef instead of ground turkey, and was pretty unenthused by the result. This was my post about it. I didn’t think the flavor was good enough, and the texture put me off, as well. I pretty much decided to go back to the first recipe that I’d tried, which I wrote about here, even though it was much more fattening.

But I decided recently to give Gina’s recipe another chance, this time with ground turkey, as she intended. Other changes:

• My cilantro was pureed and in a tube in the fridge, not cut up freshly on my cutting board. I think this led to me using a lot more of it.
• Instead of 1/4 cup of tomato sauce in the meat mixture, I used closer to a half cup. And I used leftover homemade pizza sauce instead of tomato sauce from a can. It was richer, sweeter, and spicier than plain old tomato sauce.
• I used fresh, homegrown garlic, rather than stuff from a jar.
• My cooked rice was fresh, hot, and fluffy, rather than cold and clumpy and straight from the fridge.
• I put a little bit more pizza sauce on top of the stuffed peppers before cheesing them up and baking them. Not a ton, maybe about a spoonful.

So, other than the meat change, not huge changes.

But the end result was SO MUCH BETTER.

For one thing, they were juicier. I’m not sure why. And the texture of the cooked meat was much less off-putting. I’m not sure if it was because it was turkey and not beef, or if I had cooked the beef a little long, or if it had something to do with the hot, fluffy rice and extra tomato sauce, but it was a definite improvement.

I’m pleased by the change because the texture is what I disliked the most last time. Now I feel like I can make this again.

As for the taste, I remember thinking it was bland last time. I didn’t get that sense this time at all. I’m not sure if it was using (probably) more cilantro, or using fresh garlic, or using the homemade pizza sauce and more of it.

Whatever the difference was, it was a good one.

So Gina at SkinnyTaste, I am sorry. Your recipe is damn good.

Ripe Avocados

The last time I tried to make guacamole, the avocados were under-ripe. They took forever to peel, but because I didn’t know much about avocados, their firmness didn’t worry me too much. Except that my hand cramped up from my not-so-great paring knife technique. And when I attempted to mash them with my potato masher, it was impossible. Seriously. I even put them into my food processer and didn’t manage to get it creamy. It was more like diced vegetables, like peppers or onions.

For some reason, I still thought it was a good idea to try to make guacamole from it. Hubby and I both took about two bites before deciding to eat the tortilla chips dry. What a waste of tomatoes and cilantro.

I took pictures, but for the life of me, I can’t find them. You’ll just have to believe me.

I’ve been afraid of avocados since then. Not of eating them, but of buying them. But I was at the grocery store yesterday, and I heard them calling my name. Really. There I was, walking past the display of avocados, when I distinctly heard, “Joooooolieeeee Joooolieeeeee!” So, of course, I had to stop and say hello to the things. Looking around furtively, in case the man stocking the oranges across to me objected, I squeezed one. It was squishy. I was encouraged enough to squeeze several. All squishy.

I brought them home.

Turns out, they’re MUCH easier to peel when they’re slightly over-ripe. In fact, I didn’t even need to peel them. Just cut off the top and squish.

Sweet.

At that point, all it needed was the extras – freshly squeezed lime juice, tomatoes, cilantro, garlic, and salt.

I’ll let you read the original post if you’re interested in the guacamole. I just wanted to share my avocado experience.

Homemade Salsa

Growing up in Buffalo, NY, my family didn't exactly frequent Mexican restaurants. There was one place called "Chi Chis" (the translation of which made my school friends giggle), but my recollections of being taken there by my parents are marked by the feeling that there was nothing "good" on the menu. This can probably be chalked up to my refusal to eat beans or most vegetables. I grew out of that phase eventually but was still never exposed to Mexican food very often. I think I ate at a Mexican place during college only once or twice, and after I finished college, I moved to a small town in rural Pennsylvania where there certainly wasn't any Mexican restaurants.



It wasn't until I met Andy that I started eating Mexican food regularly, since Mexican food is a way of life for him, having grown up in the South. Currently living in Maryland, near Washington, D.C., he had access to every conceivable type of cuisine: Persian, Vietnamese, Ethiopian, Indian, Mexican, Italian, Greek, Burmese, etc. We began frequenting a Mexican restaurant near where he lived, despite getting absolutely terrible service every time, simply because the food was phenomenal. When that restaurant was replaced by another, we became regulars there, too. When we don't want to deal with the traffic involved in getting there, we settle for a mediocre restaurant near us, and we've branched out to other Mexican restaurants in neighborhoods that we pass through.

"Get to the point, Jolie." Okay, I'm getting there. Anyway, in the nearly four years that I have known Andy, we have eaten at Mexican restaurants (i.e. On the Border, Mi Rancho, Guapo's, Chevy's, and Uncle Julio's) more times than I can count. Each time, we have been served a small dish of salsa with tortilla chips, and each time, I have thought to myself, "I really should learn to make salsa." I said it out loud every time for a while, but I think Andy found that pretty annoying, so I stopped. But I usually still think it.

Recently, I found myself with too many canned tomatoes in my pantry (I accidentally stocked up at the grocery store recently, forgetting that I'd already stocked up), fresh cilantro in my fridge begging to be used, leftover tortilla chips from my guacamole last weekend, and sinus congestion that leaves me absolutely dying for something spicy. I decided to take this as a sign that it was finally time to make that salsa that I'd been talking about making for 4 years.

Several things that I knew I wanted:

Spice. Mild salsa doesn't do anything for me.

Relative smoothness. I don't mind small tomato chunks, but I just don't like huge chunks of raw onion in my salsa and will always eat around those. Plus, I am having a love affair with my food processor/ blender and jump at the opportunity to use it.

Simplicity. I don't want to go to the grocery store and buy any obscure peppers, random fruits like mangos or strawberries, or spices. I don't even want to buy a million tomatoes. I have one on my counter and many cans in the cabinet, and that's going to have to work.

Luckily, I found a recipe that accommodates all of these.

These are my ingredients. The recipe called for 2 cans of regular diced tomatoes and 1 can diced tomatoes with green chili peppers, but instead I used 3 cans of regular diced tomatoes and 1 can of chopped chilies. Also, lime juice, jalapeno pepper, fresh cilantro, onion, garlic, salt, and cumin.



The recipe said "1 fresh jalapeno pepper, chopped." I didn't have fresh, just the stuff from a jar. Not knowing how many rings constitute 1 pepper, I just scooped out a bunch and chopped them up.



And I simply can't resist taking pictures of my cilantro-chopping process. It just looks so green and nice! Honestly, I'm just glad for the opportunity to use more of it up before the bunch goes bad. I wish they sold it in smaller bunches.



Anyway, I threw all the ingredients in the blender...



Mixed it around a good bunch without completely liquefying it:



And ended up with that chunky/ smooth texture that I've only ever seen in salsa served at Mexican restaurants.



I had included probably more chili peppers than was intended, but omitted "3 drops hot pepper sauce" because the only hot sauce I have is Frank's Buffalo Wing sauce and that didn't seem appropriate for salsa. Either way, this salsa did come out with a good amount of spice - not too little, but also not too much.

And it made a LOT! Anyone know if salsa freezes well?

Looks like I'm going to the grocery store, after all. I'm going to need more tortilla chips to go with my delicious homemade salsa.