OMG! Peach Salsa

OMG! Peach Salsa - Recipe

You’ve seen it in the grocery stores. You looked at it with wonder and amazement. You thought to yourself, “Am I really seeing this? OMG! Peach Salsa.” And then you saw it was $9.00 a jar, promptly put it back on the shelf, and sadly backed away.
We are here to tell you that you can have that peach salsa and pay your light bill too. In fact you can have it on crackers, chips, chicken, meatloaf, or any other way you like because you can make it yourself and keep it in the fridge for weeks!

What Ya Need:

• 3 Cups Peaches, chopped,  pitted, and peeled 
• 1/4 Cup White Vinegar or White Balsamic Vinegar
  
• 3/4 Cup Red Onion, chopped
• 2 Jalapeno Peppers, finely  chopped 
• 1/2 Red Bell Pepper, seeded  and chopped 
• 1/4 Cup Cilantro, loosely packed  and finely chopped
• 2 Tbs. Honey 
• 1 Clove of Garlic, finely chopped
• 1 tsp. Ground Cumin
• 1/4 tsp. Cayenne Pepper

What Ya Do:

1. First, peel your fruit. (See below for directions.)
2. ​Next, in a large, stainless steel saucepan, combine the vinegar, peaches, onion, jalapeno and red peppers, cilantro, honey, garlic, cumin, and cayenne. 
3. Stir constantly and gently as you bring this to a boil over medium-high heat... if your mouth isn’t watering at this point, there’s something wrong with you! 
4. As the ingredients come to a boil, all the sweetness, heat, and warm spices mingle together in a conspiracy to seriously tempt you to go get a spoon... but don’t! Wait for it... 
5. Once you reach a boil, reduce the heat and simmer gently and patiently until the salsa thickens slightly. This should only take about five minutes. Remove from the heat right away or you’ll have peach paste.
6. Serve warm or chilled with fresh bread or crackers with cream cheese or on top of meatloaf, or chicken. OMG!

SPECIAL SKILLS LESSON: Skinning A Peach

Heat up a pot of water to a rolling boil. We use a spider (our favorite wok tool) to gently place 3 to 4 peaches into the boiling water. Don't overload... give them some room to move around in the water.
While peaches are heating up put a large bowl or your composter next to a bath of cold water (we suggest a bowl of ice water sitting in your sink). We’ll use this to collect the skins and pits of the fruit. 
Watch your boiling produce carefully for signs of readiness. You will notice them start to peal away or even puff up a bit after only a minute or two in the boiling water. Remember, you aren’t trying to cook them, you just want to loosen the collagen bonds between the fruit and the skin (that just sounds gross, doesn’t it??). Anyway... you’ll only need to boil the fruit for a couple of minutes to loosen up the skins.
Using your spider (you gotta get one of these if you’re going to do much of this... it’s GREAT!), scoop out the fruit from the boiling water and plop (gently) into the ice water. 
Wait for the fruit to cool enough to handle, about 2 minutes in ice water.
Here is a fun little trick. You know the seam that runs down the side of a peach? Hold the warm-ish peach between the palms of both hands. Starting at the top of that seam next to the stem end of the fruit, use your thumbs to pull the skin apart using the seam as a starting point. Most of the time, the skin separates neatly down the line of the seam and slides right away in one easy piece. Generally, the skins will slide right off but you might need to coax them a little with a paring knife. 
Finally, use your paring knife to cut the fruit in half, or in quarters if they are still bit under-ripe, and remove the pit. Finally, chop your naked fruit into 1-inch chunks.