Chilled ?Cream? of Zucchini Soup

For Mother’s Day the Missus and I sent my Mother-in-law to cooking class to learn how to “cook” raw food (that’s what she chose and you gotta keep the Mums happy!) She’s been loving it and sent over this recipe for us skeptics to try it out. Her endearing email:

Remember the cooking class you got me for Mothers’ Day? Well, I took a class from Chef Allie Kent (Raw Food Prep) and wanted to share a wonderful veggie recipe that I’ve been getting praises from every time I make it for my friends. I hope you will try it and enjoy it as much as I do! Love you, Mom

Hmmm. Raw food. My first (and only) experience with raw food was shall we say, interesting. We decided to try a raw vegan restaurant close by and being pretty hungry heading in there I ordered the recommended “amazing” $26 mushroom “burger”. When my burger arrived on a huge plate I got excited and thought so far so good! Looking at my dinner I realized I had a deconstructed burger with all the toppings scattered about the plate. Lettuce (check!) tomato (check!) and so on but….where’s the burger? Granted we were sitting at a dark candlelit table but for the life of me I couldn’t see it. I hadn’t planned on playing the ‘find the burger game’ for dinner–it was like a game of hide & go seek. We were stumped. By the process of elimination we deducted that the silver-dollar sized clump was the ‘amazing’ $26 burger. Imagine that filling me up! It didn’t and needless to say that was the beginning and the end of my raw food adventure.

But I like to live on the wild side (and keep all the ‘rents happy) so I gave this recipe a go. I’ll admit it’s not so bad! Actually quite refreshing on a hot day–not too many of them left with Autumn creeping in.

Thanks to Kathleen for making me brave again. Here’s her recipe:

RECIPE:

Makes about 2-3 cups I think. We actually forgot to measure….

2 medium zucchini, peeled and chopped (about 2 cups)

2 stalks celery, chopped

2 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

2 tsp mellow white miso (a paste that can be found at your health food store or in the butter section of Whole Foods)

2 small cloves garlic, crushed (scale back if you’re not a huge garlic fan because the flavour is more pronounced raw)

1/2 tsp – 1 tsp Sea Salt (Himalayan sea salt is the best)

pinch of cayenne for a little kick

1 avocado, cubed

2 tbsp fresh dill, chopped

1 cup water, or additional if desired to thin

Place the water, zucchini, celery, lemon juice, olive oil, miso, garlic, salt and cayenne in a blender or Vita-Mix and process until smooth. Add the avocado and dill and blend briefly. Check for thickness and add more water if you prefer a thinner soup and blend. Serve chilled or at room temp. Stored in a sealed container in the fridge, Cream of Zucchini Soup will keep for up to three days.

This soup is awesome as a dip with fresh veggies. I?ve made this soup for several occasions and people wanted to pay me for the recipe. You can add other herbs to change the flavor of the soup. This is a very refreshing soup. Bon Appetite!

Kathleen’s first post everybody! Cheers!

All recipes are made with the finest quality farmers market whole foods, natural and non-processed ingredients as much as possible.