10 Cooling chilled soup recipes
1st Jan 2015 Recipes
Forget slaving over a hot oven or hob or sitting down to a plate of hot food when the weather is fine. Why not go for the cool option with a cooling chilled soup? Here are 10 delicious variations to choose from
Koldskål (Danish buttermilk dessert soup)
Credit: Spice in the City
This traditional Danish dessert of cool buttermilk, flavoured with vanilla and lemon zest is a light but refreshing change.
Serve with the traditional accompaniment of kammerjunker biscuits or add your own favourite berries.
Olive oil and white garlic soup
Credit: Cilantro and Citronella
This Spanish cold soup isn’t quite what it sounds like. Yes, it is garlicky but it’s primarily an almond soup thickened with bread.
The peppery garnish of olive oil ice cream made with coconut oil complements the garlic and almonds.
Honeydew soup with crab and avocado
Credit: Tasting Page
The sweetness of honeydew melons works so well in a chilled soup, and this recipe is simplicity itself.
What could be more summery than cool, sweet melon, rich crab meat and creamy avocado?
Khiyar bi laban (cucumbers in yoghurt soup)
Credit: Recipe Nomad
Lebanese strained yoghurt is diluted and flavoured with garlic and mint before cucumber is added for a cooling effect; like a thinner, lighter version of tzatziki. It’s a popular combination in the eastern Mediterranean.
Chodnik cold Polish beetroot soup
Credit: Happiness and Homemade
No collection of cold soup would be complete without a cold beetroot soup such as chlodnik or borscht, served traditionally with dill and hard-boiled eggs.
It’s another rich but cooling soup made with yoghurt, kefir or soured cream.
Chilled cucumber soup
Credit: Garlic and Zest
A slightly thicker and protein-rich vegan option, if made with silken tofu rather than a dairy base, might even tempt the non-vegans on a particularly hot and tiring day.
This soup contrasts the spicy heat of a pico de gallo garnish made with jalapeño peppers with cooling cucumber flavours.
Chilled beetroot, watermelon and tomato soup
Credit: Happy and Harried
Another beetroot based cold soup, this time combining the sweetness of beetroot, watermelon and tomato.
These three reds combine to make a really eye-popping bowl of refreshment.
Brazilian strawberry soup with mint and a coconut cream drizzle
Credit: Sons 'r' Us
Another dessert soup, this time embracing the richness of coconut cream.
Strawberries and mint are a classic combination, and this recipe adds an extra layer of flavour with vanilla and cinnamon.
Fruity green gazpacho
Credit: Farm Fresh Feasts
Not a tomato gazpacho as we would normally think, but a yellow pepper, celery, cucumber and grape combination that uses these juicy vegetables and fruit juices without any added water.
Gazpacho with balsamic caviar
Credit: Cilantro and Citronella
This is one for when you’re feeling adventurous and up for a challenge.
Enjoy a tomato-rich classic gazpacho, but with an added twist of caviar-like grains of balsamic vinegar, made with agar-agar gelling agent.
Helen Best-Shaw is a freelance food, travel and recipe writer and blogs at Fuss Free Flavours
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