Gazpacho

So the situation is this:

It's super hot outside. You have two tons of tomatoes and probably some other things like cucumbers. It's approximately dinner time and the last thing in the whole wide world that you want to do right now is turn on the oven. People are hungry in your house.

I totally hear you.

This scenario unfolds often in our house in the summer months. And on these occasions, I have a handful of tried and true easy no cook recipes that also knock back the garden's bounty so that I fear less the rapping at my chamber door by the invading army of cucumbers.

The first garden taming recipe being gazpacho.

You know, cold tomato soup.

It's a delight. You add a swirl of good olive oil, some flakes of sea salt, a few fresh basil leaves and a little garlic toast or Parmesan crisp on the side and I would be willing to do unspeakable things for it.

I won't turn on the oven, but the unspeakable things part is still up for grabs. I also save myself the labor intensive multi-batch blending scenario by just throwing all the vegetables, quartered, into the food processor because all that chopping seems like something a machine should be doing.

Let the machines do the jobs for which they were intended, I say.

I hope you'll try out the recipe on a hot summer's night and delight in its goodness.

Though the unspeakable things are optional. Fun! but optional.

Gazpacho

Adapted from You Say Tomato, Joanne Weir
My changes in bold

Ingredients
6 large tomatoes from your garden, quartered (I don't peel or seed them first)
3 small green bell peppers, cored/quartered
1 yellow onion, peeled, quartered
1 cucumber, peeled/halved/seeded/quartered
3 cloves of garlic, peeled
1/3 cup white wine vinegar
4 T extra virgin olive oil
1 stale french bread roll
Salt and pepper

To make
Throw the tomatoes, bell pepper, onion, cucumber and garlic into your large food processor (I love my 14 cupper) and blend until you have a soupy consistency. Add the vinegar and olive oil and blend until smooth.

Pour into a large bowl and season with salt and fresh cracked pepper to suit your preferences. Refrigerate it for an hour or more. 

Serve it up with some fresh basil,  a cucumber garnish, a swirl of olive oil, some flakes of beautiful sea salt, a strip of crispy bacon, a Parmesan crisp - whatever blows your hair back. 

Good eating.