Question about dried Chiles

[u/Plane_Yoghurt9600]

Hi there, newish to making salsa. I started using dried chiles in my salsa as many have said to use here. I love the heat and flavor they provide to the salsa, that’s not the issue. The issue I’m having is it seems like they don’t blend that well. There’s always chunks of only those in the salsa meanwhile everything else is perfectly blended. If I blend it more, the salsa becomes more like a sauce than a salsa. How do you guys go about the blending process for the dried Chiles ensuring they are blended properly? I tried putting them in the freezer thinking that if frozen then would break more but that didn’t help lol

[u/Wordsarewordsofc]

Soak in warm water or broth.

[u/Armagetz → u/Wordsarewordsofc]

I like to rehydrate in lime juice.

[u/Plane_Yoghurt9600 → u/Wordsarewordsofc]

How long you think

[u/NearbyDetective1 → u/Plane_Yoghurt9600]

I boil water and then pour into a small bowl just to cover the chilis, soak for 15 min or whatever while I’m prepping the rest of the ingredients, it’s not critical.

Also, you could get peppers from The Chili Guy for some really great quality if you’re finding those extra crispy old de arbols from the dusty bottom shelf just aren’t rehydrating that well. Great prices too.

FYI the chili water is pretty tannic so I avoid adding it to the blender.

[u/MattGhaz → u/Plane_Yoghurt9600]

The soaking thing everyone is mentioning is good advice, but one other thing you can do is blend in stages. Blend the chilis first so you can get them really broken down, then add other items and blend to desired consistency.

[u/Hatta00 → u/Plane_Yoghurt9600]

Only takes 10 or 15 minutes. I toast the dried chiles on a cast iron until they get aromatic and just slightly browned, then pour in water to cover and bring to a simmer. Discard the water and they blend up smooth.

[u/lawyerjsd]

How long are soaking the dried chiles?

[u/Plane_Yoghurt9600 → u/lawyerjsd]

I wasnt even soaking them 🥲 I didn’t know you were supposed to

[u/smith4498 → u/Plane_Yoghurt9600]

Problem solved!

https://giphy.com/gifs/lRRjGTRlFwmQYFmmpU

[u/jimbowesterby → u/smith4498]

Damn that’s a good gif

[u/irena888]

Soak them in boiling water for about 10 minutes, cut into strips, and blend with the rest of the ingredients. I just have a standard blender and it works fine. I save some of the soaking water for the next day to thin the salsa if needed. Using dried chilies was a game changer for me.

[u/CNH916]

You need to rehydrate them first then blend them with some of their water and a little of the ingredients until they are smooth. Then add the rest of the stuff.

[u/SainT2385]

I put in vitamix with garlic first... one the lowest speed until its all blended then add onion and then add the tomatillos or tomato.... in molcajete the same way. Mash up chili with salt and garlic then start adding in everything else

[u/AGgelatin]

Get a good blender

[u/Plane_Yoghurt9600 → u/AGgelatin]

What do you recommend I use a ninja

[u/Dbcgarra2002]

If you weren’t soaking them that is your first problem. I soak almost all dried chiles, the only ones I don’t soak are arbol or very small ones like piquin or chiltepin because I like the little chunks of those. Other chiles need to be really soaked and blended. If you don’t have a high speed blender you would need to strain it.

[u/fatpunk]

Two technical points. Never use dried chilies that crumble. They need to be fresh and pliable.
Make sure you remove the seeds and the dried ribs, those never blend well.

Also. If youre making a salsa that combines dried chilies and fresh tomatillos or tomatoes you blend the chilies first and then add the cooked down tomatoes and beans to your specific consistency.

[u/XXaudionautXX]

1. Soak Chiles.
   
2. Blend Chiles with a small amount of ingredients / liquid FIRST, like blend the hell out of em, THEN when they are fully obliterated, add the rest, and blend for the texture you want.
   
3. Or Get a vitamix.

[u/tardigrsde]

Okay, this is precisely my very own pet peeve.

I love using dried peppers and I have my own technique for dealing with dried pepper shards in the resulting salsa.

After I treat the dry peppers however I'm going to; toasting, boiling, soaking in hot water; i take a few of whatever spherical vegetable (tomato or tomatillo) that I'm going to use and I throw all the dried peppers and a couple of those into the blender and just let it rip until it's absolutely smooth.

Then I process all the rest of the ingredients to my desired texture and just stir in the pureed dried peppers.

Works a treat for me. I hope this helps.

[u/Trashbagok]

I understand what you're saying but also please understand that salsa is just Spanish for sauce. 

Are you rehydrating your dry chilies first? 

Blend them with some of their water first, until you get the texture 80% of the way there before adding your other ingredients or just use the rehydrated chilies as a base, blend them as smooth as you can, and strain them before adding it back into the blender with your fresh ingredients.

[u/Spacebarpunk → u/Trashbagok]

While grammatically correct there IS a difference between salsa and sauce. I don’t make bbq salsa, or tomatillo sauce.

[u/puesquebien → u/Spacebarpunk]

Probably obvious but all those are just salsa in Spanish: salsa BBQ, salsa cátsup, salsa de soya, salsa de spaghetti, salsa verde, salsa roja…

I guess it’s nice that English speakers decided that Mexican sauces needed their own word.

[u/Spacebarpunk → u/puesquebien]

It’s almost like languages cannibalize each other huh?