Making Great Pico de Gallo

Pico de Gallo is a great addition to any Mexican style dinner. Used as a condiment or a dip, it can add a unique flavor and festive coloring to your Mexican style dishes. Whether you are using it as a salsa for tortilla chips, as a condiment for your burritos, or as a garnish with enchiladas and rice, many agree that a little "pico" adds a lot to the meal. It's just that good.

To start, gather up 10 large Roma Tomatoes and finely dice them. You can do this by taking a sharp knife and cutting the tomatoes in half lengthwise. Then cut off the ends and begin slicing the halves into thin strips along their length. Be sure to keep all the slices together so that each sliced half appears to remain intact with all the slices in place. Rotate the sliced half and begin slicing across your previous cuts so that you end up with finely diced pieces. It is best to use a very sharp knife on firm tomatoes as this makes dicing much easier. You should now have enough diced tomatoes to nearly fill a large mixing bowl.

Next is the onion. We use one large yellow onion for our recipe, but you can substitute it for a white, Walla Walla, or a red onion. Start off by peeling the dry skin off the onion, cutting it in half lengthwise and then cutting off the ends. Follow the same procedure used to dice the tomatoes and you should end up with a large handful of finely diced onion. Add the onion to the large mixing bowl with the tomato, sprinkle two tablespoons of salt and stir the mixture until evenly mixed.

The next step is adding the garlic. Take four cloves of garlic and smash each one with the flat part of a knife so that the skin can be easily removed. Once you have removed the skin, mince the garlic with a sharp knife and add it to your mixing bowl and stir to mix the garlic in evenly.

Limes! Lime juice is an essential ingredient of our Pico de Gallo. Cut two limes into quarters and squeeze the juice from each lime wedge into the mixing bowl and stir thoroughly. You should begin to see small bubbles forming in the liquid of the mixture. This is the acid of the lime juice reacting with the other ingredients, creating a new flavor. We’ll call it “Pico Flavoring”.

The last ingredient we will be adding is the cilantro. This recipe calls for freshly chopped cilantro. You can find cilantro in convenient bundles in the produce section of your favorite grocery. It is usually found near, and can be confused with, fresh parsley. You can usually tell the cilantro from the parsley by smelling it. To me, parsley smells like Italian food and cilantro smells like Mexican food!

To prepare the cilantro, leave it in the bundle and run it under cold water, shaking it as you do so. After rinsing it, shake of the excess water and lay the entire bundle on the cutting board. Take a very sharp knife and with your free hand gather the top of the cilantro into a compact bundle and begin making thin slices moving down the bundle as you do so until you get to nothing but stems. Throw the stems away and continue chopping the cilantro until it is as fine as you can get it. Once it is chopped, you should have a large handful. Add it to your mixing bowl with the other ingredients and stir until evenly mixed.

Once your mixture is complete, cover the mixing bowl and place it in the refrigerator for 1 hour so the mixed ingredients can react and the flavors can mix. After the “pico” has chilled, take a small sample to taste and add salt as necessary.

Serve with your favorite Mexican style dishes and enjoy!

Chris Gariando is a contributing author for Mexican Food, where you can find great mexican style recipes, cooking articles and related products.