Strawberry Salsa

I saw the Pioneer Woman make this on TV one weekend and decided to try it. I wasn’t disappointed. It was delicious! This salsa is great served with grilled fish or chicken. You could probably serve it as an appetizer with tortilla chips, too.

STRAWBERRY SALSA

• 2 pints strawberries, hulled and diced
• ½ small red onion, diced
• 1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 jalapeño, seeded and minced
• ½ bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
• juice from 1 lime
• salt and pepper, to taste

1. In a bowl, combine strawberries, red onion, red pepper, jalapeño, cilantro, and lime juice together.
2. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.
3. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
4. Before serving, taste and adjust seasoning, adding more lime juice or salt and pepper, if desired.

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Red Pepper Soup

I learned to make this soup many years ago from a co-worker of my best friend, Gigi. This recipe is so good. It’s one of my family’s favorite soups. It’s easy to make and uses jarred red peppers so you don’t have to go through all the work of roasting and peeling fresh red peppers….. unless you want to. I really like the jarred fire roasted peppers from Trader Joe’s, but you could use your favorite grocery store brand. Depending on the size of your jars, you might end up with a little bit more or a little bit less peppers than what you’d get from 3 jars of Trader Joe’s brand, but don’t worry about it. If you’re more or less close to 36 ounces, the soup will turn out fine. Oh, one other thing! You have to serve this soup with my homemade garlic butter croutons (the recipe can be found here). They’re simple to make so don’t skip it! The croutons really give the soup that added oomph!

RED PEPPER SOUP

• 2-3 tbsp. olive oil
• 2 medium red onions, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 3-5 red jalapeño peppers, chopped
• ½ cup flour
• 1 large can (49½ ozs.) chicken stock or broth
• 1 cup water
• 3 jars (12 ozs. each) Trader Joe’s roasted red peppers, drained
• 8 sprigs fresh thyme
• ½ cup sherry, or to taste
• ½ cup brown sugar, or to taste
• ¾ cup heavy cream, or to taste
• salt and pepper, to taste

1. Heat olive oil in a large stock pot.
2. Sauté onions, garlic and jalapeño peppers in oil until onions become translucent.
3. Add flour and stir until flour is cooked, about 2 minutes.
4. Add chicken stock and water, and stir to make sure all flour is well blended.
5. Add peppers and thyme sprigs.
6. Bring to a boil and simmer, covered, until ingredients are very soft.
7. Remove thyme sprigs.
8. Puree everything with a stick blender, or puree in a regular blender in batches and return to pot.
9. Add next 3 ingredients, adding more or less to taste. After adding cream, don’t let the soup return to a boil again.
10. Season with a little salt and pepper.
11. Serve with homemade garlic butter croutons.