IHCC: Green Gazpacho

This week the I Heart Cooking Clubs theme was "Loving the Leaf."  Participants had to cook an Ottolenghi recipe featuring or using a leafy green.  I again referred to his cookbook Plenty and found this recipe for Green Gazpacho.  This soup has many green veggies in it including baby spinach!  To be honest, I'm not a huge soup eater.  I don't mind a cup of soup, but something has to be served with it.  To me, soup is not a meal!  I also knew that my kids would most likely not enjoy this, so I had to have a back-up.  I ended up making Hawaiian Pizza Grilled Cheese Sandwiches to go with this (see tomorrow's post!).  Yes, the two don't really compliment each other.  But I saw the sandwich recipe and knew it would be quick and easy to put together.  This recipe wasn't difficult to make, it just requires a lot of chopping.  I ended up adapting the recipe a bit, mainly in amounts of ingredients, substitutions (sherry and cider vinegar in place of sherry vinegar, and I didn't make the homemade croutons).  I probably should have used the immersion blender because I was really pushing the limits with my regular blender.  I had to spoon some of the soup out to add the rest of the ice and water!  I made the kids have 5 bites of the soup (to get in their veggies!) but they didn't like it.  Honestly, I have to admit that my husband and I weren't huge fans of this soup either.  He said it tasted more like a sauce than a soup.  I kind of felt like I was drinking a more liqueified pesto!  The original recipe called for 4 cloves of garlic!  I like garlic, but cut it down to two cloves.  Still, the garlic seemed to overwhelm the soup.  I should have used the whole jalapeno to add a little more heat and next time (although I won't be making this again!) I would use less walnuts.  I thought 1 1/2 cups was a bit much when I was pouring them into the blender!  They added a funny texture to the soup that I didn't enjoy.  Well, I can't expect all of Ottolenghi's recipes to be winners.  There's always next week!   

Green Gazpacho
recipe slightly adapted from Plenty:  Vibrant Vegetable Recipes from London's Ottolenghi

Ingredients:
1 green pepper, deseeded
1 1/2 cucumbers, peeled
3 slices stale white bread, crusts removed
1/2 jalapeno pepper
2 garlic cloves
1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 cups walnuts, lightly toasted
4 cups baby spinach
1 cup basil leaves
2 Tbsp parsley
2 Tbsp sherry
2 Tbsp cider vinegar
3/4 cup olive oil
3 Tbsp Greek yogurt
about 2 cups water
6 ice cubes
2 tsp salt
pepper

Directions:
Roughly chop up the pepper, cucumbers, bread, jalapeno, and garlic. Place in a blender and add the sugar, walnuts, spinach, basil, parsley, sherry, vinegar, oil, yogurt, most of the water, half the ice cubes, the salt and some white pepper. Blitz the soup until smooth. Add more water, if needed, to get your preferred consistency. Taste the soup and adjust the seasoning.

Lastly, add the remaining ice and pulse once or twice, just to crush it a little.


Family Rating: So-so.