Gazpacho

This is a lovely Spanish cold soup, which is one of my favourite soup recipes – it almost transports you to Spain! I think that’s because the tomatoes have a really great depth of flavour in this recipe.

If you grow your own tomatoes in summer, then you must add this to your collection of soup recipes. If you don’t grow your own, then make sure you buy really flavoursome tomatoes. The garnish is a must.

Serves: 6

Ingredients

700 g of ripe but firm tomatoes
2 tablespoons of tomato puree
half a cucumber
3 or 4 spring onions or a small onion
two cloves of garlic, crushed
2 red capsicums, deseeded
4 tablespoons of rice bran oil
3 tablespoons of wine vinegar
2 teaspoons of finely chopped fresh herbs such as basil,marjoram or parsley
salt and pepper

For the garnish, chop very finely the following extra ingedients:
half a capsicum (green or red), a piece of cucumber, a couple of spring onions and some parsley and serve with small croutons of fried bread.

Method

1. Blanch the tomatoes by pouring boiling water over them in a bowl. Leave for a minute or two and then take each one out with a fork and you’ll find the skin will peel off quite easily.
2. Wash the cucumber and peppers – no need to peel – but take the seeds out of the peppers. Blend in the liquidiser with all the other ingredients.
3. Add water if you need to but if you add some ice-cubes to the flask, you’ll probably find this will thin it down enough.

You’ll find that in many recipes for gazpacho, you add bread or a few tablespoons of ground almonds to thicken it.