What to do with a giant cucumber!
I have a very gorgeous green fingered barre attendee named Lucie. She has the most beautiful garden and in the summer she often has an abundance of flowers which she hand ties into posies and brings in to the class to hand out. What a woman!
Last summer she brought in the most enormous cucumbers and as much as I love cucumber I was a little stumped. I had a little browse through my recipe booksa and came across a green gazpacho from an Ottolenghi book. I had most of the other ingredients apart from celery and although I am really not a fan of cold soup this one was absolutely delicious. It had a bit of a kick and I served it in shot glasses, which looked so summery and pretty I had to take a photo.
The result is below and the recipe is in Ottolenghi’s Plenty book. It was so good that I will definitely be making it again this summer. Let’s just hope Lucie has some spare cucumbers!
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Ingredients
2 celery sticks
2 small green peppers
6 mini cucumbers
1 tsp sugar
150g walnuts ;lightly toasted
1 fresh green chilli
4 garlic cloves
200g spinach
25g basil
10g parsley
4 tbsp sherry vinegar
40 g greek yoghurt
225ml olive oil
450ml water
2tsp salt
Roughly chop all the ingredients then pop into a blender with half the water, oil and yoghurt and blitz until smooth. Add water to the consistency that you like. Taste and adjust seasoning. Serve chilled with a stick of cucumber
