BBQ’D OR ROASTED RED PEPPER SALSA

1. Rinse your red peppers and jalapeños and leave them whole. Blacken them on all sides on your BBQ or directly on your gas burner (electric probably works just fine too). You want at least about 75% of the skin blackened so it’s nicely roasted inside- if it starts turning white, turn it over, it’s over-cooking! When they’re nicely charred, throw them in a sealed environment to steam until they are cool enough to handle, about 20-30 mins. We usually use a big steel thermos-kinda guy, but you can use a small pot with a lid, a plastic bag, or you can wrap everybody individually in aluminum foil.
2. Place your onion (paper, roots and all) on your BBQ or burner and do about the same: blacken it on all sides and then set it aside to cool.
3. When your peppers are cool enough to work with, wipe all the char away with your hands. If it doesn’t come away easily, steam for longer and try again. Pull off the stems. Open the red peppers up and clear out all the seeds and any big pulpy bits.
4. Peel the charred layers off your onion, and cut the top and bottom off, so you have a nice, clean, steamy orb- it looks tasty already!
5. Peel your garlic cloves, split them in half and pull out the shoot that is growing in the centre- chuck that guy.
6. If you have a food-processor or other device, chuck in the red peppers, onion, garlic, a splash of olive oil, a quick dash of salt, the juice of 1 lime and half a jalapeño. Blend. If you don’t have a device, dice everybody up real fine and throw them into a mixing bowl. Either way, we’re going to proceed with caution while we add more salt, lime juice and jalapeño to taste. If it tastes too intensely red peppery, or if you added too much jalapeño, you can tone it down with half a can of diced tomatoes. If it’s too roasty and you want it to taste lighter and fresher, you can add a raw red pepper.

OPTIONAL

1. If you have BBQ and want to go a different direction with this salsa you can skip the red peppers and slice a pineapple up, remove the core and lightly BBQ on all sides of your slices. Rather than blending, give everybody a nice rustic chop and toss in a mixing bowl with your lime juice, olive oil and salt to taste.
2. A third iteration can be made by skipping the red peps and lightly BBQing some peach halves. Let them steam a bit in a sealed container after heating, so the skin will be easy to peel off. Again in this case, skip the blending and go for the rustic chop! Half and pit a small handful of cherries and throw them in too!