Suzy's Gazpacho - Veg Power

Suzy’s Gazpacho

Suzy Glaskie

Featuring:

Cucumber

Peppers

Tomato

Effort:

Complexity:

Cost:

In season now

Serves: 6

Prep time: 5 mins (+ chilling time)

Ingredients:

½ red onion

1 clove garlic

4 large, ripe tomatoes

½ cucumber

½ medium red pepper

½ medium yellow pepper

Small handful flat leaf parsley

2 cups (400ml) tomato juice

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

salt and pepper, to taste

Veg Portions / Serving: 2

Recipe donated by Suzy Glaskie for Veg Power. Photography by Suzy Glaskie.

My mum used to make loads of gazpacho when I was a kid so I’d already got a taste for it by the time I spent a few months living in Southern Spain. As a student, when I ordered this as a nice refresher in the Andalucian heat. This version is made without any bread but you can’t really spot the difference.

It’s like an extremely tasty, drinkable salad – perfect to sip on the run or as an easy-peasy starter in summer.

Method:

Blitz everything in a blender and leave in the fridge to chill for an hour or two. To serve, you can finely chop some more cucumber/pepper and sprinkle it on the top with a drizzle of olive oil. You can also pop a couple of ice cubes in for extra chill!

Engaging Kids

Kids who engage regularly with veg through veg-themed activities, such as arts and crafts, sensory experiences, growing and cooking are shown to be more likely to eat the veg they engage with. Encouraging kids to engage and play with veg is the handy first step to them developing a good relationship with veg and life-long healthy eating.

Kids in the kitchen

Peeling garlic might seem like a chore to you, but kids usually love it. Get them started by breaking the skin slightly so it’s easier for them to peel. Picking the parsley leaves and measuring the oil and vinegar are also good steps to involve them in — and we’ve yet to meet a kid who doesn’t enjoy pressing the button of a blender and plop in some ice!

Activities

While getting kids to interact with veggies for real and using their senses to explore them is best, encouraging hands off activities like arts & crafts, puzzles & games or at-home science experiments can be a great start, particularly for those who are fussier eaters or struggle with anything too sensory. Use these veg-themed activities as a stepping stone to interacting with the veg themselves. We have loads of crafty downloads here, puzzles here, and quirky science with veg here.

Sensory

Once you feel your child is ready to engage a little more, you can show them how to explore the veg you have on hand with their senses, coming up with playful silly descriptions of how a veg smells, feels, looks, sounds and perhaps even tastes. Find ideas, videos and some simple sensory education session ideas to get you started here.

Serving

The moments before food is offered can be a perfect opportunity for engagement that can help make it more likely a child will eat it! Giving children a sense of ownership in the meal can make a big difference to their feelings going into it and the pride they take in it. You know your child best, but if you aren’t sure where to start, we have some fun and simple ideas for easy roles you can give them in the serving process over here.