This home-canned Roasted Tomato Guajillo Salsa is not hot. Instead, it has a deep, rich, layered flavour.
There are two main types of salsas in Mexican cooking; the cooked type, as illustrated by this one, and fresh ones, which are used for dips, etc.
Cooked sauces such as this one are used as an ingredient for dishes. For instance, you could pour this over enchiladas that you are going to bake in the oven.
This recipe uses guajillo chile peppers. These are not hot peppers; they are very mild peppers used to provide an under-layer of complex taste in Mexican dishes.
See also Salsa Roja, which uses ancho chile peppers.
The recipe
Jar size choices: Quarter-litre (½ US pint / 250 ml / 8 oz)
Processing method: Water bath or steam canning
Yield: 4 x quarter-litre (½ US pint) jar
Headspace: 2 cm (½ inch)
Processing time: 30 minutes
Roasted Tomato Guajillo Salsa
Ingredients
- 1 kg plum tomatoes (2 lbs)
- 1 onion (medium)
- 4 cloves garlic
- 12 guajillo chile peppers (large dried. About 100 g / around 3 oz in weight.)
- 500 ml water (boiling. 2 cups / 16 oz)
- 2 tablespoons vinegar (Either malt vinegar OR apple cider vinegar. 5% or higher)
- ½ teaspoon cumin (ground)
- ¼ teaspoon oregano (dried)
- salt and pepper (optional)
Instructions
- Start oven heating to 220 C (425 F / gas mark 7.)
- Wash tomatoes, core, cut in half and place cut side up on large rimmed ungreased baking sheet.
- Leave onion peeled, cut in fours, add to baking sheet skin sides down.
- Peel garlic cloves, seal in a small piece of tin foil, add to baking sheet.
- Bake until tomatoes and onion start to get soft, and brown a bit: about 20 to 30 minutes. Remove baking sheet from oven and let cool.
- Heat an ungreased frying pan (e.g. cast iron or a griddle) until very hot.
- Rinse dried chiles and pat dry.
- Put the dried chiles in the pan, and let each side toast for about 10 seconds, or until they just start to puff. (Don't allow to scorch.)
- Put them in a bowl and cover with the boiling water to soften -- about 15 to 20 minutes.
- Remove peels on roasted veg and put them all into a food processor.
- When the chiles are soft, remove the stems, rip them open and swish them in the water to rinse off the seeds. Add the chiles to food processor.
- Add to food processor the vinegar, the cumin and the oregano.
- Whiz the mixture in the food processor until smooth.
- If desired, you may add a bit of the chile soaking water to thin it a bit. Discard the rest of the water, or freeze for another use such as cooking rice in. (Do not add more than a bit to the salsa, or you may lower its required safe acidity. Sorry, the recipe writers do not define what they mean by "a bit.")
- If desired, adjust taste with salt (or salt sub) and pepper.
- Put sauce in a pan and reheat on stove OR put in microwave-safe jug or bowl and zap until piping hot.
- Ladle hot sauce into heated jars, leaving 2 cm (½ inch) headspace.
- Debubble, adjust headspace.
- Wipe jar rims.
- Put lids on.
- Process in a water bath or steam canner.
- Process jars for 30 minutes; increase time as needed for your altitude.
Nutrition
Guajillo Chiles
Reference information
How to water bath process.
How to steam can.
When water-bath canning or steam canning, you must adjust the processing time for your altitude.
Australia and New Zealand vinegar strength special notes.
Recipe notes
- There are roughly about 4 Guajillo peppers per 30 g / oz.
- Ball says that if you can’t get Guajillo peppers, use an equivalent amount of ancho peppers.
- Ball suggests that if you can get Mexican oregano, you should use it.
- Salt used (optional) doesn’t need to be pickling salt.
- There is no provision for canning larger-sized jars.
Usage tips
After opening, store any leftover sauce in the covered jar in the refrigerator for up to two weeks. For longer term storage than that, freeze the leftover sauce or it will eventually go mouldy and spoil.
Recipe source
- Butcher, Meredith L., Ed. The All New Ball Book of Canning and Preserving. New York: Oxmoor House. 2016. Page 174.
Modifications:
- none
Nutrition information
Per 250 ml (1 cup / 8 oz)
- 117 calories, 18 mg sodium
* Nutrition info provided by https://caloriecount.about.com
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