The Gazpacho is a cold soup made with raw vegetables. It’s typical of the Andalusian region, Spain, and it’s perfect for summer. The Gazpacho is served with pieces of raw veggies and crunchy crouton.
Ingredients for the perfect Gazpacho
To make a delicious and well balanced Gazpacho you will need:
- ripe plum tomatoes, peeled and seeded
- red and green bell peppers
- red onion
- garlic (optional)
- cucumber, peeled and seeded
- red wine vinegar
- bread, possibly sourdough. It helps thickening the soup and gives the perfect texture.
- good quality extra virgin olive oil
- salt and pepper
Then you can add some chilly sauce or Tabasco for a hot gazpacho. I also like to serve this cold soup with a brunoise of celery, red pepper and onion to a little more crunchiness.
Classic Andalusian Gazpacho
Ingredients
- For the soup
- plum tomatoes , ripe: 1.3 kilos
- red pepper , seeded and cut into chunks: 1/2
- green pepper , seeded and cut into chunks: 1/2
- cucumber , peeled and seeded: 50 grams
- garlic , crushed: 1 clove
- red onion , chopped: 1/2
- sourdough bread , crust removed: 50 grams
- red wine vinegar: 30 grams
- extra virgin olive oil: 50 grams
- sea salt , to taste
- To garnish (optional)
- spring onion , finely sliced.: 1
- red onion: 1/2
- celery: 1 stalk
- sourdough bread: 4 slices
- red pepper , seeded: 1/2
- sea salt , to taste
- ground pepper , to taste
- extra virgin olive oil , as needed
- dry oregano , to taste
Instructions
- Place a pot of plain water on the stove and bring it to a boil. Turn the tomatoes over to the bottom and, using a paring knife, cut a shallow X in the bottom. Carefully lower the tomatoes into the boiling water in batches. Remove after about 30 seconds, once skins start to crack. Immediately put the tomatoes into a bowl of iced water. Once tomatoes are cool enough to handle, peel skins, cut them in half and remove the seeds. Set aside.
- Put the 50 grams of bread into a small bowl. Ad the vinegar and press the bread. Leave it to soak while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
- Cut the red and green peppers into chunks.
- Slice the cucumber.
- Squeeze the bread to get rid of the vinegar in excess. Put the squeezed bread with tomatoes, peppers, cucumber, onion, garlic and oil into a food processor and blend until you have a creamy texture. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Pour the Gazpacho into a bowl, cover with cling film and refrigerate for at least an hour or overnight.
- Prepare the garnishes. Cut the bread slices into cubes, season with oil, salt, pepper and oregano. Bake into the preheated oven to 200°C until golden and crunchy ( about 5-8 minutes).
- Prepare a brunoise cutting the red onion, red pepper and celery into small cubes (about 3 mm). Mix these veggies in a small bowl with the slicedspring onion.
- Serve the Gazpacho cold topped with the veggies brunoise and the sourdough croutons.
