Recipe: Jorge’s Refreshing Summer Gazpacho

The UK has been going through a bit of a heatwave recently, so windows are open, fans are on, summer dresses are in rotation and dinners are light!

Jorge makes one of our favourite meals for this time of the year: cold and refreshing Spanish gazpacho. He agreed to don his apron and let me document the process for you, so if you’re looking for some food inspiration on a balmy evening, this is a quick and easy recipe for mains or an appetiser and is great for lunch the next day too.

Ingredients:

• 7 or so tomatoes, skinned and seeded
• 1 onion, roughly chopped
• 1 red pepper, roughly chopped
• 1 cucumber, roughly peeled and chopped
• 2 garlic cloves
• Handful of parsley
• A baguette – second day is best!
• A splash of olive oil
• A splash of vinegar
• Few pinches of sea salt
• Water

For toppings (all cut in small pieces): 

• Serano ham
• Manchego cheese
• Cucumber
• Onion

Tear off a few pieces of baguette and soak in a bit of water.

Peel the tomatoes.

Remove the seeds (Jorge did this easily by placing them under running water).

Place in a blender and add the baguette.

Chop in your onion.

Peel the garlic and toss this in as well.

Roughly peel the cucumber. As you can see, it doesn’t have to be perfect.

Chop into big chunks and add to the rest of the ingredients.

Remove the seeds from your pepper and chop into large chunks. Add to the rest.

Toss in a handful of parsley.

Add a splash of vinegar and a splash of olive oil.

Blend everything together until it’s nice and smooth and put into the fridge for a while. You’ll want to serve it cold rather than room temperature.

In the meantime, you can chop up your toppings. Cut the onions into small pieces.

Do the same with the cucumber.

Chop up small chunks of cheese.

And, the best part – the serano ham. Jorge used scissors to cut ours as it’s much easier than a knife.

Gather everything together and, when the gazpacho is cold, serve it up and toss in some topping of your choice.

Enjoy!