Roasted Tomatillo Salsa Verde
Fire roasted tomatillos and cherry tomatoes pair beautifully with spicy jalapeno, onion, and garlic in this non-traditional salsa verde. A little sweet, a little tangy, a little spicy – all delicious.
There are lots of reasons I love belonging to a CSA. I love the idea of supporting farmers before the season starts, guaranteeing their income regardless of weather outcomes on crops. I love the local aspect, eating food grown so close to my home and in season.
But my favorite part of a CSA? Trying things I probably wouldn’t buy otherwise.
Broccoli and green beans are consumed by the pound in our house. Tomatoes, mushrooms, peppers of all colors and spiciness.
These are vegetables I can cook with in my sleep, which is basically how I’ve been cooking lately. (Working full time, food blogging, and a teething 16 month old who keeps me up all night is exhausting.)
But then the CSA comes around and gives me a bunch of tomatillos, and suddenly I’m inspired to shake up our normal kitchen routine with this amazing homemade roasted tomatillo salsa verde.
What is Salsa Verde?
At its simplest definition, salsa verde is a green sauce.
There are two major types: Italian (made with olive oil, garlic, capers, and anchovies) and Mexican (made from tomatillos, onion, garlic, and cilantro).
Given that the title of this recipe is roasted tomatillo salsa verde, you can clearly figure out which kind we’re making here.
How to Make Roasted Tomatillo Salsa Verde
I’ll be the first to admit that this isn’t traditional salsa verde, because it contains both tomatillos and tomatoes. So maybe it’s salsa verde-ish. Or salsa verde y rojo. Salsa verde rojizo? Whatever you want to call it, it’s freaking delicious.
The first time we received tomatillos in our CSA, I only received two. I could have made the world’s tiniest batch of authentic salsa verde… or I could throw in some other tomatoes we had and make a tomatillo-tomato salsa hybrid.
You can tell which option I tried.
The slightly acidic flavor of the tomatillos. Sweet cherry tomatoes. Spicy jalapeno, the bite of onion and garlic.
It’s as simple as fire roasting a sheet pan full of vegetables under the broiler until slightly charred, then blending together with lime juice and cilantro.
That’s it. A handful of ingredients and about 5 minutes of actual hands on prep time.
How to Use Homemade Salsa Verde
I had all these ideas for how I would use the salsa verde, and instead I just ate it with a spoon right out of the food processor.
I loved it so much, the next week I requested a bulk order of tomatillos from our CSA so we could actually cook with it.
This One Pot Pork Chile Verde is a great place to start — pork tenderloin simmered in your homemade salsa verde.
Drizzle it on grilled shrimp, steak, or chicken. Spoon some into tacos, burritos, or quesadillas. Stir some into soft scrambled eggs. Pour a little on salad.
Or just eat it off the spoon, because homemade roasted tomatillo salsa verde is so dang delicious.
How to Store Salsa Verde
First off, storing your excess may not be a problem… because you may not have any left.
Even starting with 3 pounds of tomatillos, we used up all the salsa in a week. And this makes a lot of salsa. I’d say you could easily go ahead and halve the recipe so you don’t have quite so much… but you should probably make it all.
Or you know, go ahead and double it, because it’s addictively good. Make a double (triple! quadruple!) batch while tomatillos are in season and save for later.
Fresh salsa verde can be stored in an air tight container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
For longer storage, make a large batch and freeze for up to 6 months
So go ahead and double the recipe. (Triple! Quadruple!) Stock up on all those tomatillos this summer, make lots of batches, and stock your freezer for the winter so you can make pork chile verde in the middle of January.
Or you know, make a triple batch and still all eat it with a spoon. Because that’s my plan for the rest of summer.
Looking for a way to use your Roasted Tomatillo Salsa Verde?
Try this Pork Chile Verde!
WATCH THE ROASTED TOMATILLO SALSA VERDE VIDEO ↓↓↓
Roasted Tomatillo Salsa Verde
Fire roasted tomatillos and cherry tomatoes pair beautifully with spicy jalapeno, onion, and garlic in this non-traditional salsa verde.
Ingredients
- 3 pounds tomatillos, husks removed
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes
- 2 large jalapeno peppers
- 1 large onion, cut into 8 pieces
- 1 head of garlic, separated into cloves and peeled
- large handful of cilantro, stems and leaves
- juice of 1 lime
- kosher salt, to taste
Instructions
- Place an oven rack a few inches below the broiler. Set the broiler to high.
- Place the tomatillos, cherry tomatoes, jalapenos, onion wedges, and garlic on a large roasting pan. Broil for 6-7 minutes, until tomatillos and onions start to blacken. Flip ingredients over and broil an additional 6-7 minutes, until everything is soft and charred. If your broiler heats unevenly, slide the pan from one side of the oven to the other halfway through cooking time for each side of the vegetables.
- Allow the vegetables to sit on the roasting pan until cool enough to handle, about 15 minutes. Remove the seeds from the jalapenos (leave in for extra spicy salsa!). Place the vegetables into a food processor or blender, pouring in the accumulated juices on the sheet pan. Puree until small chunks remain. Add in the cilantro, lime juice, and a pinch of salt, and pulse to combine. Taste and add more salt if necessary.
Notes
The salsa verde will keep in a sealed container in the refrigerator for up a week. For longer storage, cool in the refrigerator and then transfer to the freezer for up to 6 months.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield: 48 Serving Size: 2 tablespoonsAmount Per Serving: Calories: 12Total Fat: 0.3gCarbohydrates: 2.4gProtein: 0.4g
OMG, ROASTED salsa is so amazing. It really kicks the flavor up a notch, hey?
Definitely – so much more depth to the flavor than raw!
CSAs are the best. It’s always such an adventure seeing what’s going to show up in your latest box.
Oh man, those roasted veggies look AMAZING, I’m sure they tasted just as good pureed all together. And I’m all for adding a little rojo in my salsa verde. 😉
Thanks, Tracy! Agree on the adventure aspect. Some weeks it’s a great adventure… and some weeks it’s rolling your eyes at yet another cucumber. Haha!
This is a delicious recipe. I had to alter the proportions a little, as my garden has been producing WAY more cherry tomatoes than tomatillos. Still, it was wonderful. This was my first effort at growing tomatillos; had no idea they would grow in NW Wyoming, but I’m getting lots of medium-sized ones. Thanks for sharing.
So glad you liked it, Gretchen! I’m so envious that you grow tomatillos in your garden – I had to give up on even the cherry tomatoes in my little patio garden because my dog ate them all right off the vine. This is the perfect recipe to alter proportions… in fact, I received another 3 tomatillos from my CSA this week, so I think my next batch will be heavier on the cherry tomatoes as well. Enjoy all those fresh tomatillos!
I don’t know what a CSA is (I will Google!) but whatever, this looks amazeballs. Your photos are stunning – I find red and green really tricky to shoot (I blame my Nikon 😉 ) but you make them look so beautiful. Gorgeous post and great recipe 😀
Ah! CSA = Community Supported Agriculture. You basically buy a “share” of a farm, and get one share of produce each week. You buy in before the season starts, so you’re committing to buying produce from that farm, regardless of what the crop output is that year. It’s a great way to support local farmers because they get the peace of mind of a income. It is, of course, a little bit of a gamble – if there’s a terrible weather event and crops are decimated, you don’t get much for your money. But if it’s a great growing season, the boxes are stuffed full. Because you’re getting whatever the farms grow, you get a ton of variety, which is my favorite part. We get a lot of things I don’t normally pick up at the market!
This looks awesome! And I love tomatillos! Salsa verde rojizo Is going on the menu.
Thanks, Ross! Salsa verde rojizo totally needs to be a real thing. Can we make it a real thing? Food bloggers for Salsa Verdo Rojizo!
Going to try this with yellow pear tomatoes instead of cherry…will let you know
Oooh, I bet the tomatillos with yellow tomatoes will look gorgeous!
It’s a snow day here in Ct right now and I’m in the process of making this recipe! I am just waiting for the veggies to cool ?????
Hahaha I can’t think of a better way to spend a snowday than making some tomatillo salsa. ? Totally jealous of your snowday – we barely wound up with an inch here, so off to work like normal. Sad face.
Do I take the skin off the tomatillos or
The seeds out? Does the charrin give any
Kind of
Burnt flavor to
The salsa?
Hi Stephanie – You want to take the papery outer skin off the tomatillos before roasting. No need to rub off the charred inner skin or removed the tomatillo seeds before adding them to the food processor. The salsa has a deep roasted flavor, but does not taste burnt!
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You will be pleased to know that adding a smidgen of red tomatoes to salsa verde is an authentically Mexican thing to do. My mother-in-law, my sister-in-law, and two of my close friends (all who are Mexican) have each shared their salsa verde recipes with me, and all four recipes have included red tomatoes. Apparently it “cuts” the sourness of the tomatillos.
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Do you think I could can this?
I have never tried canning so I am definitely not a good resource, but I can’t think of any reason why it wouldn’t work. Please let me know how it works out if you give it a try!
You have to use vinegar aor lime juice to can for the acidity look for a recipe then you can follow this one using canning method
This is by far one of my favorite salsa recipes. I made it for our life group the last time we had tacos and brought nothing home. The little that was left was requested to be taken. I used four Roma tomatoes because I have people who can’t eat cherry tomatoes and they work great.
Thanks for sharing your recipe.
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This is the best homemade salsa I’ve ever made!! It is soooooo good. I added an extra jalapeño because we love things extra spicy and it was delicious!
This makes me so happy to hear! We like spicy too so I’ve snuck a habanero in there in lieu of a jalapeno, although we do tone it down a little now that we have kids in the picture. 😉
Oh my! This may be my new favorite salsa recipe! I had a bumper crop of purple tomatillos and cherry tomatoes. This salsa is fantastic. Absolutely love it! I will be making this over and over again!
I’m so glad to hear this, Christi! We love it too — any time we can find tomatillos (how lucky that you grow them yourself!!) I make as much as I can and fill our freezer.
Do you think one would be able to can this??
Hi Charlene — I’m not a canner, so I don’t want to speak with certainty. I believe the final pH is important in canning to ensure no bacterial growth, and I’m not sure if the lime juice lowers the pH sufficiently to ensure the salsa is shelf stable.
Made this today, so yummy!
So glad you liked it, Christi!
I love whipping this up for parties and there is always extra to enjoy at home!
I just harvested my tomatillo crop. I started with 2 small 4 inch pots of tomatillos plants this spring & ended up with vines that covered about 6 ft square feet. I think they would have done much better if they had been planted in a sunnier place. But I was happy that I ended up with 2 gallon baggies of tomatillos. Our freeze came along about a month early this year or I would probably have had double that amount. There were litterally hundreds of really smally tomatillos & blooms left all over the vines. I will plant earlier next year. I can hardly wait to make this salsa!
Ok – what would have caused my salsa to be bitter?? I also made your chile verde recipe, and the salsa cooked up great with the pork and was not bitter….but the salsa on it’s own was bitter.
Oh no! My guess is that this is related to the particular onions or garlic you used, since I haven’t had this experience myself (or from others who have made this recipe). Bitterness is salsa is best counteracted with salt or acid, so the addition of more salt and the lime explains why it was better when you used it in the pork chile verde!
Just tasted finished product! Nummers! Thanks for making me look so good in the kitchen! Put in my make and make again recipe keeper! A real winner! 😀
Yessss I’m so glad you love this as much as I do!
What a great recipe thank you for posting. We love the taste. Glad we have a CSA.