Chilled Beet Gazpacho

It's still winter here which means even though the weather says spring, all we have are winter vegetables. Beets are the answer.

If you use golden beets instead of the red ones, you will have a gorgeous yellow soup. There is just enough vinegar in the recipe to wake up your taste buds.

Speaking of which, our taste buds behave very differently with hot and cold food. It takes a lot more of the same stuff to make an impression at lower temperatures — obvious enough ("kinetic energy of the molecules") — so you need to amp up the seasonings a tiny bit.

Ingredients

4 large beets
5 cloves garlic
1 onion
1 tbsp. French mustard
6 tbsp. sherry-wine vinegar (your best)

sea salt
chives (for garnish)

Recipe

Steam the beets until they are soft. The skin will peel off. Dice.

In a blender, combine all the ingredients with 2 cups of cold water. Process to a smooth-textured purée. Refrigerate.

If you want a finer soup, re-blend the soup right before serving. Garnish with chives.

Even a few hours is very little time to allow it cool down sufficiently in summer. Empirically, the CC had to toss in a few ice cubes after 4 hours to make it taste like it should. You should make it at least 8 hours ahead of time and let it chill. Even a day ahead is not too much.