Gazpacho

           ANN ARBOR NEWS GAZPACHO (R3A2 VERSION)
               A Make-Ahead Day-Before Recipe

2 large or 3-4 Roma tomatoes, peeled and seeded (see step 1)
1 large cucumber, peeled (seeded, too, if you want)
1/2 large red onion
1 large red pepper, seeds and membrane removed
2 large stalks celery plus 1 small inner stalk with leaves
2-5 stems parsley, leaves only
46 oz V-8 juice
1/4 c. olive oil
1/3 c. red wine vinegar
1/4 tsp Tabasco, or to taste
1/8 tsp ground black or white pepper
1 T (about 1/3 lemon) fresh lemon juice
1 clove garlic, minced
Salt to taste (I omit it: the V-8 is salty enough)
Optional Garnish: finely chopped cucumber, red onion, or parsley

1. Prepare the vegetables as indicated. To peel the TOMATOES: combine ~1 c. ice cubes and water in medium bowl to make ~1.5-2 cups ice water. In small saucepan, bring ~4 c. water to a racing boil, add 1 tomato, boil for 30 seconds and remove to ice water bath for 30 seconds. The peel should slip right off. Repeat with the other tomato(es). To seed the TOMATOES and RED PEPPER (and CUCUMBER if you wish), vertically quarter and scoop out seeds, pepper membrane, tomato jelly, etc.

2. Optional: Reserve and refrigerate a small piece of cucumber, onion or parsley to use as a garnish.

3. Have ready a ~4 qt. bowl or pot with a cover. Cut TOMATOES, CUCUMBER, ONION, RED PEPPER, CELERY and PARSLEY into blender-friendly pieces, no dimension more than ~1.5 inches. Put 3/4 c. V-8 JUICE in the blender, add ~2 cups loosely packed vegetable, and puree. Transfer to bowl and repeat until all the remaining juice and vegetables are used. If you have vegetables left over, chop fine and add to bowl.

4. Stir in any remaining V-8 JUICE and all other ingredients: OIL, VINEGAR, TABASCO, GROUND PEPPER, LEMON JUICE, GARLIC, and optional SALT. Chill for 2 hours or more. I chill overnight.

5. Optional: When ready to serve, chop the veg you reserved in step 2, or similar from the fridge, to garnish each serving. It looks pretty but the taste is great without, too.

6. Serve. Refrigerate any leftovers. The soup lasts several days in the fridge, maybe longer but we consume it too fast to know.
             Serves 8-12, maybe more.

7/16/99; 8/8/03; 6/18/11; rev for blog 7/7/18 rjm

CUCUMBER-YOGHURT SOUP

ROBERTA'S REVISED, REORGANIZED AND ANNOTATED
MOOSEWOOD'S CUCUMBER-YOGHURT SOUP
a good day-before recipe

I make the soup in two batches because Moosewood's amounts are too big to fit in my blender.

Prep time: Moosewood says 10-15 minutes. It took me more like 30.
Refrigeration time: A few hours or overnight.

Take out of the cupboard or fridge or tap
     HONEY
     SALT
     PEPPER (not in Moosewood but a little white pepper or, for
          contrast, black, is nice)
     2 c. YOGHURT
     2 c. WATER

Later, when ready to serve, if you like garnishing, you will need
     CHIVES or SCALLIONS

Prepare
     CUCUMBERS, (2 x) 1.5 cucumbers, about 2.5 lb total: peel, seed and chop coarsely. I slice the cucumber vertically and use an apple corer to remove the seeds. For the whole recipe, I use 3 largish cucumbers, 12-15 oz apiece, to get the 4 c total specified by Moosewood. The reason to chop is so that you can measure your cucumber by volume and so that the blender doesn't overheat during the pureeing.
     MINT LEAVES: remove tough stems and tear the leaves into blender-friendly size. Amount? I use (2 x) 1-3 leaves, depending on how big they are. The soup is quite minty if the leaves are too big. Moosewood said "several" leaves for the whole recipe.
     FRESH DILL: remove tough stems and pull apart larger sprigs to blender-friendly size. Amount? Moosewood said 1/4 tsp dill for the whole 2 x. I assume that meant dried. I prefer fresh dill. For the first batch I used 2 small sprigs. That didn't seem dilly enough. For the next batch I used 3 medium-large sprigs. The dill taste was faint but pleasant. (2 x) 3 average sprigs is probably good.
     GARLIC (optional; I omitted it): mince (2 x) 1/2 clove

To make the soup, puree in blender in TWO batches, each batch having
      2 c CUCUMBERS
      1 c YOGHURT (I use whole milk or low fat, not nonfat)
      1 c WATER
      MINT see above
      DILL see above
      HONEY 1/2 T (or a little more)
      3/4 tsp SALT (original full amount was 1 1/2 - 2 tsp)
      GARLIC (unless, like me, you omit)

Put soup into a bowl or pot with a cover. Cover and refrigerate a few hours or overnight.

Serve cold, garnished (optional) with chives or scallions chopped pretty fine, maybe about 1/4 tsp per person. Very refreshing and tasty.

Makes about 8 cups. Serves 6-8.

Prints on 1 sheet at 60%.
rjm 5/24/15