COLD POTATO AND CUCUMBER SOUP

Friday, June 4, 2010 · by Ilva · in

Cold Potato and Cucumber Soup

I feel pretty (oh how I want I could just stop the sentence right there but alas, no…) void of interesting things to say so I will go for the soup straight away. I am a soup fiend in the sense of being “a person motivated by irrational enthusiasm” because, honestly, if you analyse soup, it is really just a bunch of ingredients swimming in water or disintegrated in water and it seems to me that it isn’t really much to be enthusiastic about. Is it? But that is before you eat the soup because once you put the first spoon of it, it is a different story – soups can be smooth and caressing on a day of need, they can be fiery and wake up feelings you didn’t even knew you had hidden in your inner self or they can be just purely fantastic. They can obviously be bad too but why waste our time on bad soups when there are so many great ones to eat?

Cold Potato and Cucumber Soup

One of my favourites is the classic Creme Vichyssoise, a superb cold soup that really should be left as it is but I just can’t resist to revisit now and then and today’s soup is one of those variations that I have made. It is really simple which is what is good about it in my eyes although I am sure you will think of something to add to it to make it your own.

Cold Potato and Cucumber Soup

COLD POTATO AND CUCUMBER SOUP
4 servings

750 g/ 1,65 lb peeled potatoes
1/2 onion or leek, finely chopped
1 big cucumber
1500 ml/ 6,3 cups chicken or vegetable stock
150 ml/ 0,63 cup fresh cream
1-2 tblsp parsley finely chopped

- Slice the potatoes thinly and simmer together with the onion in the stock until they are completely soft and easy to press through a sieve.
- Take a not too finely meshed sieve and drain the liquid into the pan. Then press the potatoes through the sieve once or twice into the stock. It is better to do it this way as the potatoes easily gets gluey if you use a blender. Heat up and add the cream. Leave to cool down and chill when it is cold enough to be put into the fridge.
- Dice the cucumber finely. I used a mandolin with the attachment that makes thin, thin strips and turned the cucumber a quarter of a turn for each slice I made which cut the cucumber into really small dice.
- Add the cucumber dice and the chopped parsley to the soup and try for salt. Always best to do it when it is cold as it taste saltier then.

- Serve.

Cold Potato and Cucumber Soup

L

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