Hotspacho!

Last summer there was this hilarious iPhone commercial with Samuel L. Jackson. He was having a lady friend over that evening for dinner and was making a list of things he needed to do for his date night.  One line item was to have Siri set a reminder to put the gazpacho in the refrigerator, unless she liked Hotspacho. I found this hilarious, I’m fairly confident I must have walked around for months telling The Husband we didn't want Hotspacho! See the commercial here, maybe you’ll find it as amusing as I did…maybe not.

I’m also the person who goes into a fit of giggles when I hear this joke “Two peanuts were walking through a park; one was assaulted!” Seriously, I’m laughing as I write this.  For those of you who are disappointed, I never said I had a highbrow sense of humor, just a taste for delicious food and drink.

Anyway, I recently posted about making my kitchen into a Turkish Sauna as I made Cheddar and Mushroom Polenta and a friend of mine and professor from undergrad, reminded me that it is summer and I should maybe cook appropriately…and not sweat to death in my kitchen. She suggested gazpacho, or cold cucumber soup or something that wouldn't force me to shower before dining; this is why she has a Ph.D and I don’t.

I've never made gazpacho; I have no idea why actually, since I love soup and I love tomatoes.  So I decided not to sweat it out in the kitchen and do something totally different. 

When The Husband came home from work and saw me sitting on the sofa, reading a book, he didn't think anything about. But by the time 7:15 rolled around and I hadn't moved yet, he was totally confused. What was happening? Were we eating out and he didn't know?  Did he need to change? WHAT WAS GOING ON?!

I laughed and told him I had finished dinner right before he walked in the door and it was chilling. And of course he got the “What the hell are you talking about?” look on his face. I told him we were having gazpacho, and it was sitting in the freezer chilling, “ because no one wanted hotspacho!” (and I totally doubled over in laughter). His face fell. “Gaspacho? Reeaaaalllly?”  I didn't reply, I just tucked back into my book for another 30 minutes.

So the moment of truth came. The bowl came out; the husband looked down mournfully and took a spoonful. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi…. “WOW! This isn't what I thought it was going to be. This is…really…GOOD!” And I did my little internal happy dance because I won. And, let’s be honest, everyone likes winning (even when they say they don’t really care, they’re liars). I didn't get up and do a full on jig, because that would have been obnoxious and un-lady like; I did however wear a smug look on my face….we can’t all be perfect.

I used my Cuisinart to make this, you can use a blender. I also like my gazpacho to have a little texture, so I didn't puree it into tomato soup.

Ingredients:

2 LBS Vine Ripe Tomato’s

1 Large Cucumber, peeled and seeded and cut into 1 inch pieces

½ Small Red Onion, chopped

1 Jalapeno (depending on how spicy you want, you can seed it…I had a hot pepper, so I took out half of the seeds)

1 Large Garlic Clove

¼ Cup Olive Oil

1 Lime, juiced

Fill a large pot with water and set to boil

Take a knife and make an X on the bottom of the tomatoes.  Once the water is boiling, drop the tomatoes into the boiling water for a minute.  The skins should begin to pull away from the X, when they do; they’re ready to be removed.  Take them out and allow cooling until you are able to touch them.

Peel the tomatoes and throw away the skins. Then begin to seed them, when you do this, make sure to keep all of the seeds and pulp in a separate bowl and try to catch all of the juices that will spill out.

When you’re finished seeding the tomatoes, place them in the Cuisinart (do NOT start it yet!). Go back to the seeds and pulp, and press them through a mesh strainer or sieve. You want to get out as much juice as possible, without having the pulp or seeds. You should get about a cup or so.

Place juice, cucumber, red onion, jalapeno, garlic clove, olive oil, lime juice, and ½ TSP of sea salt into the Cuisinart, on top of the tomatoes.

Now comes the fun---Hit the switch and let it blend! I put mine on pulse, checking every 10 seconds to see how blended the soup was. Again, I wanted to incorporate everything, without leaving HUGE chunks of cucumber or onion, but still getting some texture. Add salt or pepper if needed.

Once this is finished, I took the soup, put it in a Le Creuset round Dutch Oven and put it in the freezer for an hour and a half. After 45 minutes I stirred it around and covered it again.

When you’re ready, place it in a bowl and I served mine alongside some tortilla chips. But you can just enjoy it as the spicy, cold tomato soup that it is.