If you’re on the west coast right now, or most of the country during the summer months, you really don’t want to light the stove, and you don’t need warm and cuddly comfort foods. You need fresh and crispy comfort foods. Here are two — a cold soup, Gazpacho, and a refreshing Greek salad.
I actually had been working on a different WFD diary for a couple of days now, but this morning at 11am I changed my mind. It’s predicted to be 97 today, even in my little cool-part-of-Berkeley microclimate, and I decided to use up a small, leftover chunk of feta cheese by making a Greek salad. Aha! Maybe more people than I would like hot weather food! A quick search said no “gazpacho” had appeared on dailykos at least since February 2016, so I am going for it.
I’m just going to copy out the recipes we use and add my notes.
Gazpacho — cold tomato and veggie soup
This soup is based on tomato juice. We use Campbell’s canned tomato juice, and we love it that way. You may have another that you prefer. We freeze the extra juice for the next gazpacho. The soup will depend on the quality of the tomatoes as well as the juice, so summer’s the time — which is when you want to have it anyway.
The recipe is from The Victory Garden Cookbook, by Marian Morash — a book we call “The Joy of Vegetables,” because it really is an all-purpose cookbook for what you produce in your garden. Highly recommended! [Review says “This has been around 20 years for a reason!”]
This soup needs to chill in the fridge after you assemble it — this also enables the flavors to blend. Also, chill the bowls you’re going to serve it in. Serves 4-6. Leftovers are great.
My comments in [ ]s.
4 large, ripe tomatoes
2 ½ cucumbers [We use one long English cuke]
1 large green pepper
10-12 scallions
1-2 cloves garlic [2, of course! or more...]
Salt [I don’t believe we end up adding extra salt outside the 1 tsp in the dressing.]
¼ cup red wine vinegar
1/3 cup olive oil
3 cups tomato juice [We like Campbell's for this.]
1 — 1 ½ cups water [Recipe says beef broth or water but I see no point in the broth — never use it.]
Hot pepper sauce [1 — 2 splashes Tabasco works for me.]
Worcestershire sauce [2 splashes]
Freshly ground pepper [I have given up measuring pepper.]
Plain croutons [I’ve never added these.]
Quick version:
1) Cut up veggies. 2) Make dressing. 3) Toss veggies with dressing. 4) Stir in juice and add sauces. 5) Chill, serve.
Official version with my comments in [ ]s:
Peel, seed [naw… just cut ‘em up!] and chop in ¼ inch dice the tomatoes and 2 of the cucumbers. Wash and trim pepper and scallions and chop into ¼ inch dice [I just slice the scallions into pretty little rounds — all the way up — white and dark green].
In a mortar, mash garlic with 1 tsp salt. [This is such a great way to convince garlic to mash! Cut into a few pieces first.] Beat in vinegar and oil. Combine this dressing with the chopped vegetables [get them nicely coated] and stir in the tomato juice. Add broth or water to the consistency you prefer. Season with a dash of hot pepper sauce, Worcestershire sauce, salt, and pepper. Chill. Slice ½ cucumber paper-thin. Serve gazpacho in chilled bowls topped with cucumber slices [optional but pretty] and croutons [optional IMO] on the side.
Greek Salad (Horiatiki Salata — Tomato, Cucumber and Feta Salad)
This recipe, officially named as shown in the parentheses above, is from Mediterranean the Beautiful, by Joyce Goldstein. I was surprised to discover what good cookbooks the “[...] The Beautiful” series are! Like a restaurant that can sell its view despite mediocre food, these books could survive on their beauty and sit unused on coffee tables (I expect many do). But we’ve had terrific luck with what we’ve tried from the “Beautifuls” that we have.
I’m having a version of this for lunch, actually.
The salad wants to sit for an hour for flavors to blend. That can be in the fridge or on the counter.
Make the dressing so it can sit a bit*:
Whisk together:
¼ cup red wine vinegar
½ cup olive oil
1 — 2 Tbsp dried oregano [I use 2]
1 clove garlic, finely minced (optional) [How can garlic be optional? :) I use 2 cloves.]
Salt and freshly ground pepper [My notes say “ > ½ tsp salt”.]
* I find this is too much dressing for the salad, but it’s yummy so extra can be used for other salads if you don’t feel like cutting the recipe.
Make the salad**:
4 tomatoes cut into 8 wedges [ I cut more, smaller wedges]
1 cucumber, peeled and sliced 14 inch thick (but i don’t peel them)
2 green sweet peppers, seeded, deribbed, and thinly sliced crosswise
[correction 7:08 pm: there was a deletion between the cuke and green pepper rows that is now fixed]
20 Kalamata olives [I used Nicoise today and they were fine but Kalas are more opinionated and stand out well in this salad.]
1 red (Spanish) onion, sliced paper thin
½ lb feta cheese, coarsely crumbled
** My notes say that the tomato, feta, and olives should be increased relative to the green pepper and cuke. YMMV.
Combine all salad ingredients in a large salad bowl or on individual plates. Drizzle the dressing evenly over the top. Let stand for about 1 hour and then serve.
What are your favorite foods for hot weather?
What’s for dinner at your place?
How do you type a cedilla in dKos5??
If you’d like to write a WFD diary, see the schedule that Mark Morgan or ninkasi23 will likely post in the comments, and/or kosmail them to offer a date.