A beautiful day in London, and a friend has asked me for my gazpacho recipe.   This is a really Spanish recipe, no cumin, no nonsense.  For best results, get the tastiest tomatoes you can find, the best EVOO, and a fine Sherry vinegar (in London I like Carbonell), get your Thermomix and a few minutes later you have summer in a glass… In Spain we have it in a glass or even in a soup bowl.  In which case, if you are having it with a spoon, you also get a little plate with the same veggies used in the gazpacho, finely chopped.  Sometimes you will get chopped hard boiled egg and even serrano or Iberico ham.  You add crunchy texture to your gazpacho if you like from any of the above.  Normally, I cannot wait to just have a glass so I part with the little crunchy bits… Maybe a nice slice of 5 seed bread or another bread of substance and you have a delicious meal.  This recipe will yield 6 portions.

Ingredients:

1000g ripe tomatoes

1-2 garlic cloves

50g green pepper

40g onion

70 g cucumber partially peeled

30g sherry vinegar

1 tsp salt

8 ice cubes (optional)

50-100 EVOO

200g cold water

1. Put all veggies in the TM bowl, plus the vinegar, salt and ice (if using).  30 seconds speed 5.  Then, (this is the noisy part, sorry), 3 minutes, speed 10.  The traditional method would have you passing the soup through a Chinoise…  This is a one bowl deal!

2. Add EVOO, 2 seconds speed 7.

3. If you want it more liquid you can add ice water, if you prefer it thicker, add about 150g of white bread (no crust) in step 1.  (I never do…)

4.  Drizzle a bit of EVOO on top for presntation if you like, or a few drops, and have your little chopped vegetables nicely diced up.

Tip: If you want to add the EVOO along with all the veggies at the start, you can, but you will get a more orangey emulsified color.