Slimy, causes bubbles, but kinda tasty

It deserved another chance.

But it would be on my terms.

So I bought 1-1/2 pounds of tomatillos and set forth to make salsa verde from this recipe. If it was to enter my mouth again, it would do so in an orchestra of ingredients. To the tomatillo’s steady piano would come the onion’s violin, the garlic’s clarinet, the cilantro’s flute, and the jalapeño’s timpani.

I would be their conductor.

The tomatillos come with a husk, but one of several reasons I warned you last time not to trust them. They are from the family of nightshades, after all. They hide. So don’t trust them.

Do eat. Don’t trust.

Inside the husk, you will find a slippery, sticky slime that both gets on your fingers–see slight shiny area on my thumbnail in the picture above–and also causes a bubbly foam to form in the colander when rinsing (which is mandatory). Give these puppies a wash-down:

I must admit, the green is a very pleasant green, which is another reason I thought this green was admissible to this very black-and-white blog. Below is not black-and-white nor only green, but it’s one of my favorite songs from “GLEE,” and I think it should be considered as an Anthem To the Misunderstood Tomatillo:

Well, after washing them behind the ears, these little fellows are ready for service. There are three ways to prepare them for salsa: broiling, pan roasting, and boiling. I chose broiling, and it worked out great. Since that’s the way I went, I’m suggesting here that that’s the preferred method. Best taste, etc. Certainly the easiest clean-up: cover a baking sheet with tin foil and away you go.

Anytime you get to blend things (see below), it makes an mediocre short order cook into a Michelin-star chef, because what comes out is quite edible when one uses the technology equivalent of a bionic piranha to emulsify the ingredients.

Blender from Big Lots.

Pre-chill

Chilled salsa

The green goes from sickly to radioactive to, after chilling, a gentle field green, suitable for the best of tortilla chip, in this case HEB’s own store brand, which hold up under both salsa and thick queso.

I must say, since we had just had queso–also made by this Yankee, but using approved ingredients (Velveeta, canned Ro*Tel tomatoes, and Jimmy Dean sausage)–dipping a chip into the salsa verde, while brisk and tart and picante, was a bit like dipping a baked potato into butter. It works, but it lacks.

Next time, we shall seek to use the salsa as an additive in something.

But for now, it passed the test.

 

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