Gasping for Gazpacho

What can I say? Here’s a gift, to apologize for the long silence, courtesy of my co-author Theresa, who lives in the even hotter south of Spain.

Gasping for Gazpacho
Theresa O’Shea

Oven-hot is the only way to describe the weather when it gets to the mid-30’s and over. Housework becomes something you do at 7o’clock in the morning or 12 o’clock at night and you start thinking that perhaps Quentin Crisp had the right idea (“There is no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn’t get any worse.”). As for cooking, suddenly those frozen ready meals don’t seem such a bad idea. All you can face at midday are salads, sandwiches, melon, water-melon .... and gazpacho.

What a wonderful and necessary invention! So simple, nutritious and refreshing – just what you body needs. And if you whiz up all the ingredients at 7am or 12am, no hassle at all to make.

So, how do you make this quintessential Spanish summer dish? How long is the proverbial piece of string? No-one, absolutely no-one, makes gazpacho in the same way and no two gazpachos ever taste the same. Everyone uses a slightly different method and uses a slightly different selection of ingredients. You may start off with the recipe your abuela (granny) gave you or that you cut out of Hola! but you soon end up with your own unique variation.

The basic ingredients are tomatoes, stale bread, olive oil, garlic, vinegar, water and salt. Optional vegetables are cucumber, green pepper, red pepper and onion. Some people leave out the bread, others substitute the bread with carrot. For what it’s worth in the grand scheme of gazpachos, my own version goes like this:

1. Place 5 or 6 ripe tomatoes in boiling water so the skins come off easily.
2. Roughly chop the tomatoes, one small cucumber, one long skinny green pepper, and one
clove of garlic.
3. If I’m in the mood, throw in a carrot or a tiny slice of stale bread soaked in water.
4. Whiz all veggies up in the minipimer (hand blender).
5. Add a good chorro (slug) of olive oil and white wine vinegar.
6. Add salt and a teaspoon of cumin (my ‘secret ingredient’) to taste.
7. Dilute with cold water from the fridge (even the cold tap runs hot in summer ...) till it’s as runny or thick as you like.
8. Garnish with chopped tomato, cucumber, onion, pepper.
9. Or if it’s really, really hot and chopping vegetables seems like a task of Herculean proportions, cut out the middle man (bowl and spoon) and slug directly from the Tupperware thingy.

Enjoy!

Valerie is the co-author, with Theresa O’Shea, of In The Garlic: Your Informative, Fun Guide to Spain