We live during a time when everything is available 24/7/365. Just because I can get a tomato or corn during freezing January, doesn’t mean I should. Over the last few years I have become much more aware of when I purchase food seasonally. I have gotten extremely picky over tomatoes. I think tomatoes really should only be purchased when they are fresh to your region. I admit that I can’t stop myself from buying grape tomatoes all year (I just need them) but I can promise you that I will NOT purchase some watery large tomato just to slap it on top of a burger.
Since the summer since so short, especially in New England, I strive to get a lot of fresh ingredients and make a lot of food that shows off the fresh ingredients. If you happen to look closely, you’ll see that my cucumber is not the greenest of greens, but it was local and fresh. I am not going to knock that. It reminds me of those large, ugly as hell heirloom tomatoes that are not the prettiest but are amazing to eat.
I have made gazpacho a lot of the summers, I have even blogged about it before, and it continues to proves that it is one of those things that draws me in. I love the flavors of the tangy tomatoes, sweet corn, spicy jalapenos, and bitter onion. It does take a very long time to cut all the vegetables down to the size of a corn kernel, give or take, but it is worth it and it makes a difference. You want everything to be roughly the same size so everything feels even in your mouth. I feel that really effects how you enjoy eating gazpacho. Additionally, I really suggest that you don’t make a huge batch (yes, this is a huge batch) and then freeze it. I did that once, I though it was gross afterwards. Please learn from my mistake, so if you know you won’t be sharing this with a lot of people, feel free to halve it.
Wanna hear something so funny? Well, I made this prior to our recent trip to Maine. I purposefully made this large yummy batch so I could bring some up and share. I brought it into work, I actually remembered it in the fridge, carried it to the car, secured it behind the seat and then left it there… for 2 whole days. In all the excitement of arriving to Maine I left it in the car. When we got in to take a quick drive for sunset beach pictures, I got a BIG nasty whiff of the gazpacho. So sad that I wasted half, and stunk up my car.
Gazpacho
Serves 16
Ingredients
- 3 ears of corn
- 2 pints grape tomatoes
- 1 English cucumber, deseeded
- 1 red onion
- 1 orange pepper
- 1 red pepper
- 2 jalapenos, minced
- 6 cloves of garlic, minced
- 46 oz tomato juice (I used 365 brand tomato juice)
- 12-16 oz water
- 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
- salt and pepper
- extra virgin olive oil, for serving
- avocado, for serving
Process
- Shuck corn and remove kernels from the cob.
- Mince the tomatoes, cucumber, onion, and peppers. All should be roughly the size of a corn kernel. Mince the jalapenos and garlic.
- Combine the corn, tomatoes, cucumber, onion, peppers, jalapenos, and garlic into a large bowl or 2, to have enough room to mix everything together.
- In a large pitcher, combine the tomato juice, water, vinegar, and salt and pepper.
- Pour the liquid into the vegetables.
- Serve with a drizzle of olive oil and diced avocado.
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