GAZPACHO AMARILLO
RECIPE: Gazpacho Amarillo (Yellow Gazpacho)
Adapted from “Best Gazpacho” at cooking.nytimes com. Makes a little over 1 quart/liter.
This gazpacho is more a drink than a soup and is served that way in its place of origin, Sevilla, Spain. Unlike many gazpachos, this recipe uses no bread, a solid amount of Spanish extra virgin olive oil, and yellow, not red, tomatoes. (Of course, it can be made from red tomatoes if desired. Merely change the name to “Gazpacho Rojo.”)
Ingredients
About 2 pounds ripe yellow tomatoes, cored and roughly cut into chunks
1 yellow bell pepper, seeded and roughly cut into chunks
1 cucumber, about 8 inches long, completely peeled and roughly cut into chunks
1 small white onion, peeled and roughly cut into chunks
1 clove garlic
2 teaspoons sherry vinegar, more to taste
2 teaspoons kosher or sea salt
1/2 cup Spanish extra-virgin olive oil, more to taste, plus more for drizzling
Directions
Combine tomatoes, pepper, cucumber, onion, and garlic in a blender or, if using a hand blender, in a deep bowl. (If necessary, work in batches.) Blend at high speed until very smooth, at least 2 minutes, pausing occasionally to scrape down the sides with a rubber spatula.
With the motor running, add the vinegar and salt. Slowly drizzle in the olive oil. The mixture will become smooth and emulsified, like a salad dressing. If it still seems watery, drizzle in more olive oil until the texture is creamy, even frothy.
Strain the mixture through a strainer or a food mill, pushing all the liquid through with a spatula or the back of a ladle. Discard the solids. Transfer to a large pitcher (preferably glass) and chill until very cold, at least 6 hours or overnight.
Before serving, adjust the seasonings with more salt and vinegar. If soup is very thick, stir in a few tablespoons ice water. Serve in glasses, over ice if desired, or in a bowl. A few drops of olive oil on top are a nice touch.
The ancient Romans prefigured our modern summer soup called gazpacho. They took a pestle and mortar and pounded together stale bread, garlic, olive oil, vinegar, and water and made of the mix a sort of room temperature potage.
After Columbus introduced the tomato to Europe, in the very late 1400s, the Spaniards added the sweet red fruit (and other vegetables such as the cucumber and onion) to this Roman “gazpacho” and sent forth to the world this quintessential hot-weather dinnertime starter and refreshment course.
The word “gazpacho” may come from the Latin “caspa,” one meaning of which is “fragments,” and also from the Hebrew “gazaz,” meaning “to clip” (as into small pieces), much in the way we talk about “chopped salad.” The influence of the vegetable-heavy cooking of Spanish Sephardic Jews on the history of gazpacho is likely significant.
But what was heretofore pounded by pestle and mortar is now nearly universally blended in a food processor or blender, although it forever remains a use for day-old bread. (Many gazpacho recipes, including one here, eschew the use of bread in order to highlight the vegetable ingredients, but stale bread and at least the idea of gazpacho are irrevocably bound together).
The recipe here is for a traditional Spanish gazpacho, that is, a silken smooth, un-chunky gazpacho. You may reintroduce chunks of vegetable by serving garnishes to individual servings of any gazpacho in the form of wee cubes of cucumber, bell pepper, capsicum (spicy) pepper, tomato, onion or scallion, even avocado, melon, or chopped hard-cooked egg.
More gazpacho recipes: for White Gazpacho; for traditional Gazpacho Andaluz with Crispy Jamón Serrano
Wine Pairings and why: It seems superfluous (right down to the Latin roots of that word) to drink wine with soup, as though one liquid needed or should pair with another, especially if the soup is cold. Most wines and soups don’t taste great together because, with little to play off each other as they are so alike texturally, they don’t feel great together. However, texture matters—on either side—and hence changes the relationship. If the wine is heavy, even alcoholic, such as sherry or Madeira, even a broth pairs well. If the soup is thick, such as this recipe’s is, then a substantial wine, somewhat high in alcohol (it adds “weight” to the wine) is a textural contrast. A sherry will do nicely here: anything from a dry fino to a Verdelho, even a white Porto.