How Green Was My Gazpacho
First off, yes I know it is a faux pax to include back-to-back posts about green. But hey, we like green around here.
My suburban brother stopped by this week with about 8 gardens worth of fresh vegetables. After polishing off the tomatoes by making several batches of Edouble’s salsa, I turned my attention to the cucumbers.
This green gazpacho is an original taste, mostly inspired by my current sweet-and-spicy fixation. I know Gansie is still not on board with last year’s trend of fruits intermingling with veggies, and I admit the flava profile here is a bit crazy, but it is a work in progress, albeit already a tasty one. Recipe after the j.
Greenest Gazpacho
Peel four cucumbers, remove the seeds and quarter.
Peel, core and slice one granny smith apple.
Dice one-half white onion.
Add all the above ingredients to a food processor and blend.
Next add about 15 green grapes. I’m not gonna say you have to peel the grapes, but if you do, the consistency of the gazpacho is significantly smoother.
Dice two green chile peppers, removing the seeds (or keeping the seeds, if you crazy, fool). Add peppers to the gazpacho and blend.
Salt and peppa to taste.
Garnish liberally with Italian parsley (or curly? dammit, which one is which again?), pine nuts (I’m topping everything with pine nuts lately, ya’ can’t go wrong) and black pepper.
Makes about 4 bowls.
Points for originality…and for referencing a film older than any two of the primary contributors put together.
Definitely the most creative take on gazpacho I’ve seen in a long time. Can you give a description of where the flavor’s at so far? Do you taste the sweetness of the grapes, the tartness of the apple, the heat of the jalapenos or the clean flavor of the cucumber most of all?
thanks…actually i think the sweetness is a little bit too dominant – the apple is the strongest taste – when I think prob the cucumbers should play more of a role – I’m wondering if I should have used more cucumbers, or perhaps there’s something else I could add to balance out the flavors a bit
Can’t say for sure, but I think you’ve got the answer right there in one of the links in your post – Jicama. Replace the apple with it, and you’ll get a milder sweetness instead of the sugary tartness of the Granny Smith.
wow – great idea – jicama also would inhance the latinness of it, justifying my naming it gazpacho
I don’t think they’d go with the flavor profile you’re working on here, but you might also consider tomatillos or some of the greener varieties of heirloom tomatoes to bring it back to a more traditional gazpacho approach.
In fact, a green gazpacho with cucumber, tomatillo and jicama (no grapes) sounds pretty good to me right about now…gotta love that August DC heat.
A little cilantro or citrus might be nice too, though I wonder if they would overwhelm the base flavor of the cucumber.
poor, delicate cucumber is so easy to overwhelm