Salsa Borracha (Drunken Salsa)

This one is a little unusual. When I first saw Marcela Valladolid cooking it on her show "Mexican Made Easy", I thought she may have been drunken herself. I had never heard of making a salsa with dried chiles, orange juice, and tequila, but it looked like a pretty good topping for meats and tacos.

Start by removing the stem and seeds from 8 ancho chiles. These chiles are dried from the poblano chile. They are a deep red color and are sweet with tastes of raisin and plum.


Put the chiles on to a dry frying pan over medium heat for a minute per side until they are slightly toasted. Tear them apart and put into a blender.

Add to the blender, a cup of orange juice, 1/2 cup of a good anejo tequila, a minced garlic clove, and 1/4 cup of olive oil. Puree until well blended and add back into frying pan over medium heat for about 5 minutes, until thickened.


Puree until well blended and add back into frying pan.

Cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes, until thickened.


Now for the fun part. I created a little dry part of the pan to pour the tequila into a pool.

Then I set the tequila on fire and let it slowly burn out.

Finally, blend it all together and season with salt and pepper.


Let it cool down, then transfer to a serving bowl. Top with crumbled anejo cheese. While the alcohol is cooked off, you will soon be singing and dancing once you make this one.