Recipe: Cold Avocado Soup with Cucumber and Yoghurt

I haven’t been posting many recipes lately, because I haven’t actually been cooking that much. There have been some culinary discoveries in my kitchen and I’ll share them all eventually, but first I need to tell you about THIS COLD SOUP. It’s been a while since I’ve been so completely wowed by a recipe that I feel the need to get on a soapbox or sing it from the rooftops, or else I might burst. Here’s a bit of context though: spring has officially sprung in this corner of the world, and with it came an appetite for tangy, fresh dishes, salads and cold soups, and lemon, definitely lemon, and also avocados. Browsing through my recipe bookmarks, I came across this beauty, and the stars aligned. (Also… I appear to love avocados even more than I realised, seeing as the last few recipes have all involved this wonderful green fruit.) I didn’t quite follow the recipe to the letter, so here’s my take on it.

 Ingredients (2 large portions)

• 2 avocados
• 1 cucumber
• 1 very small onion, or 1/2 normal size
• small handful of fresh flat parsley (or cilantro as per the original recipe)
• 150g full-fat or Greek yoghurt
• juice of 1/2 lemon
• salt and pepper to taste
• (really) cold water
• olive oil

Peel the cucumber, cut it in half lengthwise and scrape out the seeds with a tablespoon. Then cut half of the cucumber and one of the avocados into large chunks. Dice the onion and roughly chop the parsley. Place the chunks of cucumber and avocado in a mixer along with the onion, parsley, yoghurt, lemon juice and a good pinch of salt, as well as some freshly ground pepper and a dash of cold water. Process until smooth and pour into a bowl. Refrigerate.

Dice the remaining half of the cucumber and the second avocado. Add the chunks to the avocado paste and add some more cold water until you reach the desired creamy consistency. Refrigerate until serving time. Drizzle with some olive oil just before serving.

Optional: dice a small tomato and top the soup with it. Enjoy!

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Recipe: Chicken with Avocado-Yoghurt Dip

It occasionally happens that you get inspired. On Monday, I was going to make this recipe and follow it pretty much step-by-step. I was also feeling supremely lazy (so if you’re feeling too lazy to click on the above link to the original recipe, I totally hear you – it’s called “Greek Chicken Skewers with Avocado Tzaziki”), so I decided to make this recipe even less work than it originally was. I was going to leave out the skewers and just fry the chicken breast. I was also going to leave out the “Greek seasoning mix”, mainly because I wasn’t quite sure what it was (I’d never even heard it was a thing), what it contained, and was too lazy to google it – so I was just going to replace it with whatever Mediterranean spices I could find in my spice drawer.

And then, inspiration struck. Because what exactly would happen if in addition to the olive oil, garlic and assorted spices I coated the chicken breast in tahini before frying it? In one word: magic. The tahini really made the chicken pop! And the avocado-yoghurt dip was divine. On a side note, I’m refusing to call it tzaziki, for the love of Greece. The poor Greeks already have it hard enough as it is without folks – and worse, Germans – butchering their cuisine (although, might I say, in a freaking delicious way). And on that note, this video, made by German public television (you will not believe this), is absolutely BRILLIANT. It had me in tears laughing.

Man, so many words for such a simple recipe. So here it finally is. It admittedly doesn’t photograph very well (poor lighting, bad camera, etc.). It was a whole lot more interesting than it looks in this picture. The dip, which was velvety avocado-yoghurt perfection. And the chicken breast was soft and at the same time almost-crunchy tahini perfection. Maybe the next time I’ll add some actual sesame seeds too, to make it even better.

Ingredients (2 portions)

For the dip:

• 1 avocado
• 150g natural yoghurt (I used the low-fat kind and it was still incredibly creamy)
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 8 drops tabasco sauce
• 1 pinch oregano
• pinch pul biber
• freshly ground pepper
• salt

For the chicken

• 500g chicken breast
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• pinch of oregano
• pinch of pul biber
• pinch of thyme
• 2-3 tsp tahini
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• salt

To make the dip, place the pitted avocado, yoghurt, garlic, and lemon juice in a blender and whizz until smooth. Add the tabasco and spices, stir, cover, and leave it to chill in the fridge while you make the chicken. Wash the chicken breasts and cut them into thin strips. In a medium-sized bowl, mix the olive oil, tahini, garlic, and all the spices. Add the chicken to the bowl and mix until it’s is evenly coated in the dressing. Fry the chicken pieces in a non-stick frying pan until golden. Serve with the avocado-yoghurt dip and enjoy!

Recipe: Pear and Avocado Salad

You know the kind of food that’s so good you want to cry when it’s gone? And how it’s even better when you can cobble said meal together in about 10 minutes? Because this salad, you guys, this salad is it. It’s so unbelievably fresh and creamy at the same time, sweet and sour and mustardy and avocado-y and all other kinds of goodness. This is a comfort food dish that’s not just rewarding, it’s also healthy.

Unattractively enough, the original recipe is from the January diet programme of a women’s magazine. But don’t judge a book by its cover, right (erm, I do that all the time to be honest… #loveprettybooks). Anyway, this is my take on it, I did tweak a few things. The original has you use curry powder, but I’d run out so I used some spices that also go into curry and it was just fine. But if you, like a normal person would, have ready-made curry powder rather than an assortment of random spices sitting in your pantry, just know that you can use it here.

Ingredients (1 portion)

• 1 pear (with peel)
• 1/2 avocado
• juice of 1/2 lime
• 2 tbsp natural yoghurt (I used the full-fat kind)
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• small pinch of each: ground coriander, turmeric, ginger (alternatively, curry powder)
• A few shavings of parmesan or Idiazabal cheese

In a medium sized bowl, mix the yoghurt, mustard, lime juice, and spices for the dressing. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Finely grate the pear and add it to the bowl with the dressing. Mix well. Slice the avocado. Place the avocado on a plate and top with the pear and the cheese. Enjoy with some Swedish crisp bread.

Recipe: Moroccan Lemon and Yoghurt Soup

Do you ever get that thing where you suddenly notice something – a word, a song, a book – and all of a sudden, it’s everywhere? I’ve had that a lot learning languages. You’ve never seen a particular word, but all of a sudden you need to know what it means and don’t know how you could ever live without knowing it, because wherever you look, that word pops up. Well, this can also happen with food. Chickpeas, for instance. I knew they existed somewhere alongside me in this universe and that you could make some pretty amazing stuff with them – hummus, for example – but I’d never cooked with them until quite recently. And bam, out of the blue, recipes involving chickpeas are everywhere. I don’t seem to be able to get away from them. Chickpeas are the new black, or something like that.

This soup is just one example. It’s amazingly quick to make and one of the most summery soups after gazpacho. In fact, it’s ideal when you want summer, but the seasons don’t quite play along: this soup is refreshing and warming at the same time.

Ingredients (2 portions):

• 1 small onion
• 1 courgette (2 if you can get very small ones)
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• salt
• 600ml vegetable or chicken stock
• 2 threads of saffron or 1 good pinch of ground turmeric
• 150g chickpeas (canned), drained
• 200g natural yoghurt (I used whole milk, but you can also use the kind with 1.5% fat)
• juice of 1 lemon
• 1 egg
• some mint leaves

Cut the onion into fine rings and the courgette into 1cm thick slices. Mince the garlic. Sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil together with the cumin. Add a bit of salt. Add the stock, saffron, chickpeas, and courgette. Bring to the boil, cover, and let simmer at low heat during 10 minutes.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the yoghurt, lemon juice, and egg. Take the soup off the heat and slowly stir the yoghurt-lemon-egg mixture into the soup. Season to taste and sprinkle generously with mint leaves. Enjoy!