So, do you like your salsa mild or spicy? Most of the time I prefer MILD salsa. To me, if it’s too spicy, the heat gets in the way and I can’t taste the flavors of the food!  By the way, if you find your mouth about to spontaneously combust, HERE is a great tip on to help stop the burn of spicy foods!  This salsa recipe has a delicious flavor to it, but it can be customized to heat it up to be as hot as you like it!

The recipe here starts out to be a MILD salsa, so if that’s what you like, follow this recipe.  If you can take more heat, you can spice this up a little or a lot, depending on your taste. Some suggestions follow the recipe…

1 – 14.5 oz. can fire roasted, diced tomatoes (with the juice)

1 – 14.5 oz. can diced tomatoes, drained

2 tablespoons chopped yellow onion (or about 1/4 of a small onion)

½ teaspoon minced garlic

2 tablespoons diced green chiles (or ½ of a small can)

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon black pepper

½ teaspoon sugar

½ teaspoon ground cumin

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro

Put the can of Fire Roasted Tomatoes and the diced onion into a blender (I love to use my Magic Bullet Deluxe Blender because it has a small blender container and this recipe fits into it perfectly!)  Blend until smooth and the onions are chopped fine. Add the remaining ingredients (except for the cilantro), and blend.

Add the chopped cilantro last and just blend briefly to chop the cilantro leaves a little bit more.

Cover and store in the refrigerator.

Okay, if you are really brave, you can spice this up!  You can either double the amount of onion, add 1 chile from a can of Chipotle Peppers in Adobo sauce (cans are found in the Mexican food aisle) or add some fresh chopped jalapeno peppers. (Be sure to remove the jalapeno seeds unless you want it to be really HOT!) Make it to your taste and heat tolerance.

Serve it with tortilla chips or use it as an all-purpose condiment. (It’s delicious on scrambled eggs!)