While this salsa verde is Mexican, pretty much every culture has a green sauce of some sort. Elsewhere on this site I have a German green sauce and an Italian salsa verde, both with fish. I like both sauces, but they’re not this one. This is what most Americans think of when you hear the words salsa verde. It’s a Mexican classic, and a good thing to know how to make.
The recipe below is one I’ve tinkered with over the years, after eating lots of them and trying recipes from such greats as Rick Bayless and Diana Kennedy. What I like most about this version of salsa verde is that almost everything is grilled or charred, and that adds a ton of flavor to the final salsa.
I prefer to use the tiny, “wild” tomatillos for this recipe, which are known as milpa in Mexican markets. But really any tomatillo will work. Just don’t use the purple ones, as they’re too ripe for this. You want the acidity of green tomatillos, especially if you are canning. I happen to have them growing uncontrollably in my garden. How they got there, I have no idea.
I also like to use New Mexican Hatch green chiles here, too. They’re cheap, plentiful and will often grow pretty straight, making them easier to roast and peel. Anaheim or poblanos are excellent, too. You could use a regular green bell pepper if you had to.
How do you use this salsa verde? Well, with tortilla chips, of course. But also as a base for chile verde with pork, chicken, pheasant or whatever. And like all green sauces, it’s fantastic with fish.
This recipe can be canned, with a couple minor alterations I detail below. Since you need to do a lot of charring and roasting to make it, it’s a good idea to whip up a big batch and can what you don’t eat straight away.
Tomatillo Salsa Verde
Ingredients
- 1 to 2 pounds husked tomatillos, preferably the little milpa tomatillos
- 1 1/2 cups poblano or Anaheim chiles, roasted, peeled, seeded and chopped (about 4)
- 1/2 cup jalapenos, peeled, seeded and chopped (about 3 to 5)
- 4 cups white or yellow onions, sliced
- 6 cloves garlic, whole and unpeeled
- 1 tablespoon cumin
- 1 tablespoon dried oregano, preferably Mexican
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt
- 2 tablespoons chopped epazote (optional)
- 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
- Lime juice to taste
- Fruit Fresh or other source of citric acid (only if canning)
Instructions
- If you don't have your green chiles and jalapenos prepped, follow these directions for roasting peppers. Arrange the tomatillos, sliced onions and the garlic cloves on a cooking sheet (or two) and set under the broiler until they are a bit charred.
- Once you have all the vegetables prepped, peel the garlic and put it and everything else into a food processor and pulse to make a rough salsa. You're done if you don't want to can your salsa. Kept in a covered container, it will keep a week in the fridge.
- If you are canning, add 1 teaspoon of the Fruit Fresh (citric acid) to each pint jar; the jars should be sterilized beforehand. Pack the salsa into the jars, and use a knife of chopstick to remove as many air pockets as you can find. Leave about 1/2 inch headspace. Seal the jars and process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.
- When the jars are ready, lift out of the boiling water and let them rest until their lids plink. Once they've cooled to room temperature, the salsa will keep in the pantry for more than a year.
Wild Game Sauces
You can find all sorts of recipes for sauces that are great with fish or game, here on Hunter Angler Gardener Cook!
Great salsa verde! Never makes it to canning step…
Made this to compliment the Duck Taco recipe, super good!
This is a late summer canning staple for me, having it on hand all year round is a must
With Hatch chile season upon us again I finally got around to making your version. All I ‘m say is “Wow!” The oregano is something I’ve been missing in my tinkering. Absolutely great salsa Hank. Nice work!
When you say 5 cups of Tomatillos, do you mean whole or roasted? They shrink a little when they are roasted as you know? I am canning so I want to make sure I do it right.
Stacy: That’s a good point. It’s 5 cups of little tomatillos, so about 6 cups of the larger ones. Yes, uncooked and out of the husk.
Hello again! I apologize for all the questions… but approximately how many jars does this recipe make? I’m trying to do pre-preservation math 😀
Becca: It makes about a quart.
If you didn’t grow any Hatch Chile’s, you can buy them online already toasted, frozen in 5 lb batches.
Jay: Good tip. They are $0.80 a pound at my local supermarket now, too.
Currently my backyard jalapeños are taking a vacation from producing much of anything. However, I have some dried and also some dried and smoked jalapeños. Can you recommend using either of those items?
Thank you for your help.
If we don’t have the small tomatillos, is there a weight equivalent for bigger ones? I made this but it turned out to have too much jalapeno – likely due to the wrong amount of tomatillos.
Linda: Yes, about 2 to 3 pounds.
I canned five gallons of tomatillo salsa this year and there’s another seven pounds of roasted tomatillos sitting in the freezer. The salsa makes an old shoe taste good!
Try it on grilled halibut tacos instead of tomato salsa. That was a revelation for us.
Roasting these li’l sweeties is a must!
I’ve been on a tomatillo kick lately and was thinking
of picking some more up tonight.
Never thought to put oregano into the mix. Can’t wait to taste it!
Thanks for including the canning instructions!
Hank,
Are the “wild” tomatillos you use the same as ground cherries or the like?
This looks delicious! I just got some chips yesterday from the farmer’s market, and this looks like a worthy recipe to pair with them. Yum!
Wonderful, haven´t yet tasted a salsa verde I haven´t liked. Specially with barbacoa or pig meat.
I have not seen feral tomatillos or milpa like yours, although I have had several times feral little tomatoes in my backyard that sprung by themselves, and have seen them at the margins of creeks. The plant can either stand by itself or be more like a creeper (forgot the correct word in English), and the tomatoes are smaller than cherry varieties, with many seeds, but a strong tomato flavor.
We just got soem fresh tomatillos in our CSA last week! What providential timing, Hank!
Yippee… I lived in Austin TX for 35 years and always asked for tomatillo salsa to accompany chips… This recipe looks terrific and I look forward to making it. Thanks
How funny! I just made this for chile verde (your recipe) yesterday! It was labor intensive, but fun! I was guessing at the extra acid and now I don’t think I added enough. But I was planning on eating it on an elk hunting trip next week, so it should still be safe. Thanks!