Fruit Salsa and Cinnamon Chips

A friend of mine brought fruit salsa and cinnamon chips to our house when we had them over for dinner over a year ago. When I asked her how to make it, she mentioned the things that were in it, but no amounts, so I just kind of tried my own thing. I discovered that this recipe has a lot of flexibility to it. For this batch I believe I used:

1 mango

2 kiwi

1 apple

2-3 Tbsp. apple jelly

You simply combine them in the mini-chopper/food processor, or you can chop finely/crush the fruit by hand. For a prettier version, I have used strawberries in place of the mango. The apple and apple jelly provide a good foundation to give the salsa some solid matter to hold the whole thing together so you don't end up dipping chips into fruit juice that slides right off. Other than those 2 ingredients, though, the recipe is pretty adaptable. Just use a couple of different kinds of somewhat soft, juicy fruits you think would go well together. For the chips, you simply cut tortillas into strips, spray with Pam, sprinkle with cinnamon/sugar, and bake at 350 until tortilla chips are crisp (usually 10-20 minutes).

Do not use homemade tortillas. They are TOO thick, and if they are cooked until they are crisp, they will be very difficult to chew.

If you do, you may decide they just are not getting crispy after 30 minutes in the oven.

Then you may think it would be a good idea to broil them.

If that happens, you will be startled to see that the sugar has been carmelized and burned after just a couple of minutes.

You will take the pan out of the oven and set it on the table to take a picture of your ruined chips.

For the split second your back is turned, your toddler will reach up to get a chip and burn himself on the pan which has just been in the broiler.

After you get that taken care of, you will spill the chips all over the floor.

While you are cleaning those up, dinner will burn too.

Of course, all of that trauma is just hypothetical...not that I know from experience or anything. :) Here is what I imagine such burned, carmelized chips would look like:

Okay, so it wasn't hypothetical. Suffice it to say, next time we make these chips, I will be getting tortillas from the store. I would rather avoid all of the trauma listed above. And my teeth will thank me, too, as these chips were more like rocks.