When I lived abroad there were foods that I missed and sometimes paid a fortune to buy imported. But nothing compares to my mother in law mailing a jar of her homemade salsa 4000 miles so that Paul could enjoy a taste of his childhood garden. Once we completed the massive renovations on our house and converted the concrete desert back into a garden we were able to grow our own tomatoes and Joyce sent me her salsa recipe. She very kindly said I can share it with you so that you too can eat it straight out of the jar in secret so the kids don’t get any. Not that I do that. Honestly.

INGREDIENTS
1.5kg tomatoes
50g pickled jalapenos
3 chillies
1 onion
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
100g tomato puree
150ml white wine vinegar
55g brown sugar
2 tsp coarse salt
2 tsp unsmoked paprika
1/2 tsp garlic powder

• Chop the vegetables so that they’re similar sizes. Deseed and chop the tomatoes. Peel and chop the onion. Deseed and chop the peppers. Chop the chillies and jalapenos.
• Put all the ingredients into a large pot and cook on a medium/high heat for 1 hour. Stir frequently and turn the heat down if the vegetables are catching on the bottom.
• Spoon the salsa into sterilized jars and seal tightly. Sterilized jars of salsa will keep in the cupboard for a year. Keep opened jars in the fridge.