Now that it’s time for great tomatoes, do yourself a favor and give this amazing gazpacho recipe a try. Thank me in the comments.
It’s become our go-to gazpacho, it’s so good!
After I read the description of this gazpacho in the NY Times and remembered how good it was when Chef Jose Garces made it at his house a couple of years ago, I needed to give it a try. Use the best tomatoes and olive oil you can.
Best Gazpacho recipe:
- 2 pounds of red tomatoes, cored and cut into chunks
- 1 Italian or Anaheim pepper, seeded and cut into chunks
- 1 cucumber, peeled and cut into chunks
- 1 small onion, peeled and cut into chunks
- 1 clove of garlic, peeled
- Part of a Serrano chile, seeded and thinly sliced (optional, if you like a little heat)
- 2 teaspoons Sherry vinegar
- 2 teaspoons salt, more to taste
- ¼ cup good olive oil, plus more for drizzling
Combine the tomatoes, pepper, cucumber, onion and garlic in a blender.
Blend at high speed until very smooth, about 2 minutes.
With the motor running, add the vinegar and 2 teaspoons of salt, taste and add the Serrano chile if you’re using.
The next part you might want to do in batches unless you have a big blender.
Very slowly pour in the olive oil, so the gazpacho can emulsify. It will thicken and change color, becoming more orange.
If it seems thin, keep slowly pouring in the olive oil and it will thicken up. Taste and adjust the vinegar, salt and oil as needed.
Strain and discard the solids.
Pour into a pitcher and chill for at least 6 hours or overnight. Serve in glasses with a drizzle of olive oil on the top and enjoy!
My verdict: Fabulous! It took a few minutes, but the color did change and the texture and taste was perfect. You really need a blender for this – sadly, a food processor won’t give you a fine enough puree.
I didn’t have the right kind of peppers, so I seeded and chopped a couple of pepperoncini, and they worked fine.
Since you really taste the oil, be sure to use something delicious. If you wanted, a shot of vodka might be interesting.
The original recipe suggests pouring the gazpacho over ice, which I think is a good idea; even though ours had chilled all afternoon, it never tasted really cold.
And forget Christmas in July, I’m thinking about making a batch and freezing it, so it can be August in the middle of January!
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This cabbage soup was making the rounds of the Internet recently and everyone was raving about how good it was. It’s from 
Cut out the cabbage core and finely chop it. Cut the leaves into 1/8” ribbons.
Potato leek soup is good any time of year.
Preheat the oven to 400°.
My verdict: I’ve never made vichyssoise with crème fraîche before and if there wasn’t some in the fridge, I probably wouldn’t have used it this time either – which would have been a big mistake! It gave this very rich soup a nice depth of flavor that’s sometimes missing. Roasting the potatoes and leeks was a great idea and the next time I do it, I’d just toss some garlic cloves in the mix. If you were doing this in the summer and didn’t want to heat up your oven, grilling them would most likely be great! If you like a finer purée, use a blender, for a chunkier version the food processor is fine.
In preparation for this I roasted 4 heads of garlic separately (cut 1/2″ off the tops, put in an oven-proof dish, sprinkle a little olive oil, cover with foil and roast at 400 degrees for an hour), not knowing how many I’d need (about 1 1/2 heads) to flavor but not overwhelm the leeks. Frank was wondering about adding bacon which would be fine, but not necessary – maybe as a garnish? This is great hot or cold, so depending on the season…
Egg-Lemon Soup is my go-to soup when I’m not feeling well.
My verdict: As I said in the intro, it’s my go-to when I’m sick. You’ve usually got all the ingredients on hand, it’s easy and tastes great!
