Editor's Note: This is a slightly-modified version of a letter that was originally read on the Alison Rosen Is Your New Best Friend podcast.
Hola,
First of all, let me say, I'm a huge fan of your product. Let me tell ya, as a kid who wouldn't eat vegetables, it was salsa that introduced me to the idea that veggies could be turned into junk food. And over the last few years...starting with the roasted chipotle varieties and moving on to mango and peach and even peach-mango!...you’ve been doing a great job diversifying the flavors.
But there is a problem – specifically with regards to your packaging. Now here's where I ask Tostitos, Mission, and Newman's Own to go ahead and sit the rest of this letter out. You're all doing fine. Sorry to bring you into this.
The rest of you need to listen up:
THE MOUTHS OF YOUR JARS ARE TOO MOTHERFUCKING NARROW.
We all know there are two main ways to consume salsa –
Ladling it onto your food with a fork or spoon like some kind of goddamned fancy person which is easily a distant number 2 to the most common way –
Scooping it up with a tortilla chip
Now I want you all to go to the grocery store right now and look at tortilla chip sizes. Go on, I’ll wait…
What’d you find? Did you see that almost all tortilla chips are about 2 inches in diameter? That’s about a half inch larger than your preposterously small jar-mouths, isn't it, you lunatics? In fact, most of these chips can only barely drop their tiny little chip-nutsacks into the salsa where they'll be only light kissed by the salsa before, like a married chip's nuts, those kisses dry right the fuck up!
Is there another product so absurdly incompatible with the very product required for its own consumption???
I mean, holy hell, after only a few dips, the salsa becomes reachable only by broken chip.
Broken. Like our spirits.
Which, of course, leaves us with either a tiny piece to nibble like a goddamned squirrel, or a bag full of crumbs to throw away or give to your wife when she’s still eating carbs.
And when the salsa finally dips too low...this is when the drama really begins because now we are forced into the humiliating act of pinching the chip oh-so-carefully between two trembling fingers – NO THUMBS – and – like the world’s saddest game of Operation – nervously try to not touch the edges of the jar or BZZZZAAT! Salsa fingers!
Now, I know what you’re saying – Just pour it into a bowl, silly willy.
First of all DON’T CONDESCEND TO ME! I know what’s really going on here. You want me to pour it out knowing I can’t judge how much I’m going to eat and then I’ll pour too much and have to throw away a tablespoon here and a teaspoon there and before I know it I’m buying an extra jar or two a year.
Or, is it just that you assume we’re all pouring your delicious fucking salsa into a nice ceramic fiesta bowl for all of nuestros amigos who come over every day at 5 for some sangria? Well listen to me muchachos, I feverishly consume your yummy condomente sad and alone and I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE.
And don't think I can't feel your judgemente every time I pry open one of your roasted chipotle-glued lids and, abandoning all self-respect, try fishing out that piece of chip that just snapped off. The one I can’t...quite...reach...
I also sense your pity at my no-fiesta-having lifestyle, but let me tell you something – without us lonely solo salsa eaters, you’d be nothing! You’d be fuckin' CHUTNEY – gathering dust in the ethnic foods aisle instead of partying it up in the chips section!
And so, because I know you’re not going to listen and you’re not going to change, just know this:
I hold head and my be-salsaed middle fingers high and defiant!
Thank you and God bless the United States of America