We had a small crop of tomatillos due to the crazy wet and cold weather this year and decided to make a nice simple tasty dipping paste for use in enchiladas and such that highlighted the unique tomatillo taste and trying not to overpower it with chilli or other flavours.

The tomatillo variety we use here is a green fruit that is about 1-3 cms diameter that stays mostly inside the husk even when it grows bigger. It grew ok despite the inclement and unsuitable weather where tomatoes failed almost completely.

All up for this recipe we used about .5 kilogram [approx 1 pound old speak], 6 large cloves of garlic, half a red capsicum and 1 small red chilli.

I am unsure of the exact variety of chilli but it was a medium Thai style that ripens up to about about 4cm long that i have growing in a large pot of random mild to medium heat chilli plants I have grown for general eating without the risk of burning mouths.

The tomatillos were all washed in a colander under cold water to get rid of the weird sticky surface coating. It is a strange bitter substance but easily washes away.

Next all the components were placed on a a baking tray on alfoil under a medium top grill about 20cms below the heat and then slowly roasted with the top heat till they collapsed and browned a bit on top. This is essential to get the full unique tomatillo flavour.

Then the components were placed in a blender and blended to a slightly chunky texture but that has a nice gloss on it from the liquids involved.

We ended up with about 500 mls of paste.

It is very tasty and really brings out the unique and interesting taste of the tomatillos. That grilled tomatillo juice is quite amazing. We thought that adding other things like tomatoes or other spices would really swamp or muddy the delicate flavour.

We ate it combined with black beans, mexican style red rice, grated cheese, sour cream, chopped lettuce, and shredded BBQ’d chicken strips wrapped in simple corn and maize wraps . Spectacular!!

Apologies as the photos here are not great  due to being quick snaps on phone while it was being made.