Homemade Freezer Salsa

This year, my tomatoes went absolutely crazy in my garden.  We are not huge tomato eaters, so in order to use them up, I made freezer salsa.  The rest I just washed, dried and froze them by 10's (or so) in a freezer bag.  Then, when I want fresh salsa in the middle of January, I will take them out, toss them into a pot of boiling water, remove them and take the skins off, and I'll be ready to start a batch of freezer salsa!  At least I hope that is what I will do, I've never tried it until this year, but my neighbor assures me that it works.

Freezer Salsa

by: Carolyn

10-12 tomatoes

2 small peppers (I used some from my garden, and I don't know what variety I planted.  But they are small, light green, and not very hot.  Does that help?)

1 serrano pepper, sliced, with the seeds removed (you can leave the seeds if you want more heat in your salsa--we're a mild family, around here)

handful of cilantro

1 tsp. minced garlic

1 Tbsp. dried, chopped onion, rehydrated (actually, just slightly less)

1 1/2 tsp. sugar

juice of 1 lime

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. fresh ground pepper

Blanch your tomatoes by putting them in boiling water for 30-60 seconds, then taking them out and putting them right into a bowl of freezing cold water.  Then the skins should slide right off.  Remove the stems, cut them in half from the top and then squeeze out the seeds.  Toss them in a blender and blend them up until they are the consistency that you like.  In a food processor, finely chop your peppers (whatever kind those were...), serrano pepper, and cilantro.  In a large pot, stir together the tomatoes, pepper mixture, garlic, onion, sugar, lime juice, salt and pepper.  Bring it to a boil and then reduce the heat and simmer it for 10-15 minutes.  Feel free to pull out your tortilla chips and start tasting it now.  I added things and got it to the flavor I wanted, while I was cooking it.  Pour it into your jars, or containers and freeze it until you are ready for it.  

Monica's Fresh Salsa

I got this recipe from Monica and have made it a couple of times for parties that we were attending. Both times it got rave reviews. I figured Monica won't post it herself (I was going to say a mean jibe about how she won't post unless the recipe has her name in it, but then I saw that she put TWO recipes on today! Way to go Monica!) Here is a little tip that I learned after the first time making it: don't cook the beans or corn. It does make a difference (even with that mess-up it still got rave reviews).

Monica's Fresh Salsa

2 Roma tomatoes

1 can black beans

1 can corn

cilantro

3 limes

3 avocados

3 green onions

salt

Dice the tomatoes, avocados and green onions and put them in a large bowl. Finely chop your cilantro and throw it in, too. Pour the beans and corn in as well. Squeeze your limes into the bowl and gently stir it all together. Add enough salt that you like the saltiness of it (novel idea). Actually, all of these ingredients are to taste. If you aren't a cilantro fan, go easy on that one. If you adore avocados, add another (how's that for alliteration?). You get the idea, right? And here is what we did with the leftovers:

Oh, it was double delicious on our hamburgers the next night! We used ranch instead of ketchup and mayo and it got two thumbs up (mine and Dustin's).