In a sentence: I love food!!! Homemade items are at the top of my list. So about 10 years ago when a half-Mexican friend of mine brought her homemade salsa for a work potluck, I was instantly hooked. The downside was... I could no longer stomach store-bought salsa. Pace, Picante, even my previous favorite Rojo's, just didn't do it for me anymore. It was like I could literally taste the processing and preservatives.

Well, after bugging said friend on a just about weekly basis to make salsa, she finally said: "do it yourself, it's easy" and gave me a recipe. It will cost you about $10 to $15 for a 16 - 20 cup batch (maybe a little more for the first batch if you don't already have the spices, minced garlic or lemon and lime juice), but it will last a lot longer than those little 5 dollar jars you get at the grocery store. And as long as you keep it refrigerated, it will last a good month.

Through trial and error of the past decade I have added and subtracted a few things for my personal taste, but here goes the basics. However, before we get started, if you don't own a food processor, invest $15 - $45 in one. Trust me... it makes this a much less time consuming task if you have one (chopping everything completely by hand can take hours if you're OCD like me).

Here's what you'll need:

10 Roma Tomatoes

1 Red Onion

1 Yellow Onion,

5 - 15 Jalapeno Peppers

2 - 5 Habanero Peppers

5-7 Sweet Peppers

Cilantro

1 Can Diced Tomatoes (experiment with different types. I've used fire roasted, garlic, Mexican lime juice, etc)

Lemon Juice

Lime Jiuce

Minced Garlic

Spices (I like to use freshly ground pepper, chilli powder, cayenne pepper, seasoning salt, garlic salt, onion salt).

First chop the veggies, add them to your food processor along with the minced garlic and chop away. I have a 8-cup size, so with the above amount of veggies, you are looking at 2 full bowls. Also if you are using a food processor, you don't have to cut the veggies really small. Let it do the hard work. After that, add the now finely chopped veggies to a bowl, stir in the can of diced tomatoes (drain first for a thicker sauce), add a splash or 2 of the lemon and the lime juice and season with the spices to taste. Mix all the ingredients and serve! If you refrigerate the salsa overnight, that gives all the flavors time to sit and distribute themselves nicely together before you serve to the masses.

Two things to remember: #1.) I measure nothing!!! EVER!!! If you worried about making it too hot, taste test each pepper prior to mixing. You can always add more of the other veggies as well if that's the case. Same if you use too much salt or any spices, add more tomatoes to even it out. #2.) Experiment. I add different types of peppers and onions for different tastes and believe me, little things like that make subtle differences, but you still keep your same base taste.

DJ Nyke's salsa, Townsquare Media
DJ Nyke's salsa, Townsquare Media
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*My secret ingredients are a few splashes of Frank's RedHot Hot Sauce and Tony Chachere's Seasonings and a vidalia onions (when I can get my hands on them). But once again, play with the recipe... make it yours.*

I love it on eggs, in cheese dips... salsa makes just about everything better.

P.S. - That bowl was all the way to the top when I brought it to work this morning. Ian, Tom and Tee Roy (as you can clearly see) are huge fans of my recipe.

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