Brad Makes Fermented Salsa

Hey, a nice day on It's Alive.

We're gonna be making fermented salsa,

a really simple red tomato, chile,

garlic, onion, couple little wild cards salsa,

fermented, blended, eaten with some corn chips,

fermented salsa, baby.

[upbeat music]

I just got some organic grape tomatoes,

and that's what we've got there.

That's our base. We got one pound, okay?

And then we got a habanero chile, fresh, and a serrano,

two very, very delightful, fresh chilies, okay?

We're gonna leave 'em whole as is,

and then I got four, five, six,

whatever you're into, cloves of garlic,

and then I got a dried chile, a dried Morita chile,

which it has already a nice little smokiness to it

and I think will add just a really nice depth to the salsa.

And I got a little cast iron skillet going,

nice and hot over there.

I'm just gonna throw the garlic in there,

give it a little dry little roast.

And then these chilies, you could roast 'em up

in the cast iron, but what I like to do

is I'm just gonna place 'em right over the fire here

and just let 'em get a little blistery.

And then right into the cast iron,

which is gonna move fast, okay?

Be ready. We're gonna go on this.

We have a little black cumin,

a couple things of fennel seed,

a little pink peppercorn.

Gonna let that toast up.

Don't go walking away from that,

from anything at this point, really.

Habaneros, yes, they're hot.

You can use any chile here at this point.

[cast iron scrapes burner] [dramatic music]

Oh, God.

Oh, don't. We're not gonna lose...

Aw, we'll burn off any of the germs.

[laughs] Not a problem.

[dramatic music]

Oh, come on. Crap.

So look, we're gonna add that right into the tomatoes.

At this point,

[spatula bangs against cast iron]

even the garlic, really, it's nice to just open it up.

As soon as they start getting a little crackly,

you do not wanna burn 'em at this point.

Whenever toasting seeds, the worst thing you

could really do is just go walking away,

getting super distracted.

When you try to go out and get some nice dried chilies,

which I highly recommend,

it's one of my favorite ingredients,

try to find ones that are pliable.

You don't wanna get ones when you touch 'em,

they just shatter and turn into dust.

You want ones that are nice and still have a little bit

of life in 'em, so have a little bit

of pliability to the skin.

I like to just crush it up,

let that join the party real nice there.

And the same with the peppers. I forgot.

When I roast 'em, I leave the stem on 'em just

'cause it's easier to handle,

but I remove 'em at this point.

[fly buzzes] [hands clap]

What else? What'd I forget?

Oh, salt and an onion.

The onion,

[deep jazzy music] [snaps]

let's put a little color on it.

I feel like everyone's got a half

of an onion in the fridge or somewhere,

you know what I'm saying?

Well, this recipe calls for half of an onion,

so if you don't have a half of an onion, you do now.

And then salt.

You could go one, one and a half, 2%.

I just do it as I would as if I

was making it just intuition, just like if I was cooking

'cause at the end of the day, just if I chop this up,

that's probably how much if I

was gonna make like a fresh salsa.

It's probably about how much salt I would add.

So this I'll just cut up, and again,

that's just gonna add a little bit

of that Maillard reaction.

Whenever you caramelize something,

it's gonna add a little bit of depth of flavor to it.

And that's it. So we'll throw that into the bag.

That was a big onion, a big half.

I'm gonna reserve one, okay?

All right, let's vac it up there, Kevo.

We'll get this set up.

We'll have one as like a roll in pantry.

[dark ominous music]

[static hisses] [beep]

And then we'll have one where I

can set up some cool stuff, some projects,

so we can start hanging some things, get real weird,

maybe dry some fruit.

[fly buzzes] [claps hands]

Maybe chicken feet. I don't know.

Don't even look at it, Kevin!

Keep your big zoom lens even away from it.

Look at that hair.

You don't even have to go pushing nothing. NutriChef.

They did not cut corners when it came

to sensors underneath those buttons.

I'll tell you what. I respect that.

NutriChef. I'm standing by it.

You can go ahead and call me, guys.

Oh, you know what we gotta get, Kevo,

for the new shop, for the new chambers?

Wherever we may land, here or somewhere,

even more beautiful, I don't know,

is one of those vacuum sealers where it's like, all right.

It's like a unit. They're legit.

The restaurant folks know where you lay it in

and it's a whole chamber.

You lay it in, you close the door,

and it's like, Shaboom!

And they say it's none of this little [trills] thing.

It's like a whole. [sucks teeth]

This thing's working great.

So what I like to do is give it a little smash.

This'll happen on its own as it ferments,

but I like to just speed it up a little bit,

just really get the party started.

And at the end of the day, that's what we're trying to do.

We're trying to get this party started.

So yeah, we're gonna let this hang out.

It's about, I'd say around 70, 69, 71 degrees in here,

so I'm gonna say this'll take about five days.

[slow relaxing elevator music]

No, no, let's dial that back. This is gonna take, tomatoes.

I betcha it gets a little warmer here at night.

[chalk writes on chalkboard]

Say three and a half days, maybe four, Kev,

and then that's it.

And then we're gonna blend it,

and we'll get some chips, and we'll call it salsa.

[slow relaxing elevator music]

We come back. Oh, how about now?

You ready, bud? So look.

Wow.

That's our salsa. That's our bag.

So all the tomato broke down. Oh, [beep].

[slow somber music]

Let's rewind.

[static hisses] [beep]

So I made a mistake.

It's not the end of the world, and the show will go on.

And since we're doing swaps and it's not a big deal,

but I forgot, and it's actually a happy accident

because I often will add it at the end just

for a nice, fresh vibrance, but look.

I pulled the swap out, and I was like,

Yeah, so everything broke down, the tomatoes.

And I was like, What is all that green stuff?

I usually throw some cilantro in.

It doing the fermentation, and it leaches out,

and it just gets a really nice thing.

This is actually very nice, and it works really well.

But if you do what I did here and leave out the cilantro

and just let all the other good things ferment

and get happy and marry, and then, after you blend it,

hit it with some fresh cilantro,

get some chopped up tender leaves and stem at the end,

it's even better.

So boom! So that's what happened here.

So with this one in four days, I'll add some fresh cilantro

to it, and I think that'll be great.

I forgot the cilantro. It's that simple.

But you know what?

Since in this situation where COVID and the pandemic,

I'm doing all these things.

I'm making all these projects.

I'm not a big swap guy, but if I'm gonna do swaps,

I like to do 'em myself, like stunts.

Like Tom Cruise. Don't he do all his own stunts?

I do all my own swaps.

I'm just not as weird as Tom Cruise.

But Tom, if you're listening, and I love you,

and Mission: Impossibles, I don't care what anyone says,

those are great movies.

All right, plowing forward.

Whether or not you forget your cilantro, here we are, okay?

So this one fermented for about four days.

Onions broke down nicely, right? Look at that.

Cilantro's in there, wilted out,

tomatoes are turned into just liquid, right?

Just skins and liquids, but look at that.

It doesn't look that great,

but it doesn't look that bad, right?

Ah, I was thinking the same thing.

So let's open it up.

Ooh, I tell you what.

Right off the nose, yeah, right off the nose,

right out the bag, I smell a little bit

of that really nice roasted habanero floral spiciness,

the sweetness from the tomatoes.

I'm excited. So what you do, pay attention.

This gets a little complicated here.

It's been really simple so far.

Make sure your blender is off and clean, off and clean,

and then you just go ahead and dump all that right in there.

So yeah, you could rock and roll just like this.

It's a little soupy and a little chunky

in some spots for me.

[hand smacks blender lid]

So I'm just gonna hit it with the little zzh!

All right, I'm gonna start slow, all right, babe?

You ready?

[whoosh] [blender revs]

Oh, good God, that's not very slow.

Oh, this one's got the turbo.

[blender whirs softly]

That's it. It smells wonderful.

[object taps on blender]

You could blister up those tomatoes, too.

For me, it can be a little too much

to blister up all the tomatoes,

but I really like, in this fermented salsa,

I really like adding the char on the peppers

'cause it just comes through.

It cuts that raw, fermented, vegetal,

and it just gives it that little bit more depth

of like a finished product. Ho ho hoy!

Enough yapping. Let me get a bowl.

[tomato cries] [bowls clatter]

Here, we'll start small, okay, Kev?

Oh wait, let me taste it first.

At this point, always taste and adjust seasoning.

Oh my God, it's perfect. Ha!

It's so good. And there you have it.

[laughs] You could make it any texture you want.

I like this.

It could be a skosh chunkier.

That thing was on turbo when I kicked it on.

All said and done, I'm still very happy with that,

and oh, look at this.

We got some chips.

I hate eating by myself in front of a camera. I truly do.

Mm, it's so good, crunch crunch, but I'm gonna do it.

[chip crunches]

Not to reference Chris Morocco, but I'm gonna.

He doesn't throw me compliments very often,

but a couple times, he's like,

one of 'em, I think, was mustard, and he was like,

with his quirky eyes and [beep], he was like,

This is the best thing you've ever made.

It's literally the best thing he's ever made,

and he doesn't believe me when I say that,

but it's literally- It's borderline insulting.

It might be a little hint spicy for ol' Morocco,

but he might be like,

This is one of the best things you've ever made.

It is phenomenal, and it's so easy.

You saw it here. All's you need is this.

You don't even need this. You can use a jar, all right?

This is old-school style of cooking,

real simple but just the little steps.

Toast up your spices. Get good spices, okay?

Get a nice dried chile.

Learn about dried chilies 'cause they're not all the same.

It's not just dried chile.

There's a whole spectrum of different types

and different cultures that use 'em.

And dive into 'em. That's how you learn.

But look at this now.

We're making really awesome salsa in a bag,

fermented, raw, fermented, good for ya.

I love ya. Let's keep fermenting.

We'll see you next time. Bon appétit.

[glass shatters]

I was aiming for that.

[relaxing elevator music]

[beep]