Gazpacho Recipe

If you google "Gazpacho Recipe", you'll find a plethora of gorgeous photos, history and tips for the creation of the perfect gazpacho.  Gazpacho is a Spanish dish served during the hot summer months.  It requires no heat to prepare and the cook doesn't have to get near a fire.  I have been making it a lot lately, and as my husband has a food allergy to avocado, I have been restricting the ingredients.  However, I was alone for two days at our house in Norman and realized that the farmer's market was going on.  

I found these tomatoes.  Grown locally by a family from seed, one might not realize at first what a treasure that is.  Commercially produced tomatoes ripen uniformly in color and the shoulders (the part around the stem) ripen at the same rate as the rest of the tomato.  That's pretty but at the expense of flavor.  For more information on heirloom tomatoes, click here.  The cucumber was also local and organic.  The nice thing about a farmer's market is that you can talk to the person who planted the food.  I used this cucumber without removing the skin- which tasted fresh and had nothing sprayed on it. 

First, I stuck half of the cucumber in the food processor and chopped it up. I love food processors- this took four seconds. 

My poor husband would die if he at this avocado.  As you can see, I dice it right in the jacket. 

Ok, tomatoes are just cute. There is no other reason for this picture other than me playing with my food. 

Tomato, red pepper, avocado and cucumber all diced up in the bowl.  This will be the chunky/crunchy part of the soup. 

Next, I blended up a bunch of cilantro and parsley with the remaining few chunks of tomato and cuke. 

Just for kick, I added half of a fresh lime and some very smoky chipotle powder.  The red bell pepper, chipotle and lime will give the mixture a distinctly southwestern flair. 

I stirred everything together and thinned it out with spicy V8- about a cup.  This is the end product. 

It's highly recommended that you add some extra virgin olive oil to the soup to hang the flavors on.  I can take it or leave it.  The other common practices are to add a bit of vinegar or vinegar-soaked bread crumbs.  I did neither...... this time.