A cup of coolness, cucumber soup.

Mmmmm. This past weekend brought us some much needed rain, a few breezes and a very slight breather in the heat wave we’ve experienced this summer. But it’s still in the 90’s, and anything that has the word “chilled” as part of its name, gets my attention. We had some very pretty little cucumbers in this week’s CSA box of summer goodness, and I’ve made a quick, easy and delicious Chilled Cucumber Soup. And since my mission is to come up with delicious ways to use up all of that goodness, I made another tomato pie Saturday night—a variation on my last one that I’ll call Tomato Pie II—using a pound of red and yellow heirloom tomatoes and some beautiful organic red onions, along with some fresh basil and thyme, a little wine and some gooey-good soft goat cheese—and we had some leftover pie along with the soup, since tomatoes and cucumbers go together so wonderfully well.

Tomato Pie II before and after cooking.

The cucumber soup recipe is one my friend Wanda passed along to me which she copied from a newspaper clipping, and it’s so easy you can make it in about 5 minutes…my kind of quick. All of the fresh ingredients—raw cucumbers and sweet onion, buttermilk, mint, yogurt, chicken stock, lemon juice and seasonings—go into the blender, then whiz, whiz, chill, and you’re done! A lovely, savory and healthy soup, served cold. I changed a couple of things from that original recipe to suit my taste, and also plan to try some variations that I think might be good, too, but there can be no doubt that this base recipe is very satisfying, indeed! Enjoy it alongside your favorite summer foods, perhaps with a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich or a salad—or a slice of tomato pie—for a light and delicious summer supper. We finished off our meal with some of Susan’s Nectarine-Lemon Buttermilk Sorbet with Bourbon that I had in the freezer for dessert. Sweet.