Fresh Homemade Salsa with Aerogarden crops

T. Poole left a comment on my May 9 post recommending making salsa out of my Aerogarden harvest. I decided to take this advice and looked up a great salsa recipe on Allrecipes.  To my delight, it used lots of tomatoes and lots of cilantro.

So, today was the day I finally harvested my crop of cherry tomatoes, which started in my Aerogarden VeggiePro (now the AeroGarden Extra), and then was transplanted into a big flower pot by the kitchen window. Here's what they looked like:

Next step was harvesting the cilantro. If you recall, I have cilantro growing in two places: the Aerogarden unit...

...and the extra seeds, I planted in the flower pot next to the cherry tomatoes

For those of you keeping score at home, the cilantro in the Aerogarden unit grew at least 2-3x faster than the one in soil.

I took my cherry tomatoes and chopped them.

Next,  I chopped up the cilantro:

I added salt, garlic, onions, lime juice, and chili peppers to the tomatoes and the cilantro into a bowl (I couldn't find cerrano chiles, so I used long red hot chilis I found in my local supermarket). Then, I put it into the refrigerator for an hour.

When it came out, here's what it looked like.

I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting much. But I kid you not, this was the most amazing tasting salsa I've ever had. It was light, fresh, and with a nice kick from the chilis, not at all like the thick gooey salsa you get in a jar, nor even like the over-done salsa you get at those fast food Mexican restaurants.

I almost polished off a whole bag of whole grain nachos in one sitting with this. And it was satisfying to know that half of it was made with things I had grown in my own kitchen.

This was the first, but will not be the last time I make this. Thanks to T. Poole for the suggestion!