Since I’ve been growing Tomatillos in the garden, I’ve been looking for new recipes to use them in. I found a couple interesting recipes on the web and adapted them to my own tastes and came up with this one. Grilling the Tomatillos, onions and peppers adds a delightful smokiness to the salsa, so you really need to make an effort to grill them. I made this recipe for our annual trip to the Vintage Illinois wine festival at Mattheissen state park and it disappeared quickly even with a lot of other food around, which let me know it was a hit. This is an interesting alternative to Guacamole, and a nice change when Tomatillos are in abundance.
Ingredients
- Approximately 2 pounds Tomatillos, husked and washed
- 2 large Jalapeno peppers, quartered lenngthwise, seeds and pith removed
- Approximately 1/4 of a large red onion, large dice
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 3 or 4 ripe avocados
- Juice of 1/2 lime
- 2 Red peppers, I use hot hungarian
- 1 bunch cilantro
- Olive oil
- Granulated garlic (to taste)
- Pepper (to taste)
- Salt (to taste)
- Sugar (to taste if needed)
Instructions
- Halve and remove stem from the Tomatillos.
- Put the Tomatillos, onions and peppers in a bowl and sprinkle generously with salt, pepper, granulated garlic and olive oil, mix well to coat evenly.
- Grill this mixture on a very hot grill, in a grill pan until the vegetables start to brown a bit. If the grill isn't very hot the Tomatillos will turn to mush before they start to brown.*
- When the mixture has cooled a bit, puree it in a food processor along with the garlic and lime juice.
- Peel and seed the Avocados, and dice to about 1/2 inch cubes. Combine in a bowl with the Tomatillo puree. Add the chopped bunch of the cilantro to taste.
- Seed the red peppers and remove the pith, chop fine and add to the mixture.**
- Mix well, taste, and add salt as needed. You may want to add some sugar depending on the tartness of the Tomatillos.
- Serve with cornchips.
Notes
*You could probably roast the vegetables in a 450 degree oven, but the grilling really adds a lot of flavor, so grill them if you can.
**Usually the grilled Jalapenos don't add a lot of heat so I add hot peppers to get a bit of spice in the sauce. The red peppers also add some color and flavor to the salsa, so use sweet ones if you want the dip very mild.
