Serves 2-4. This is the easiest chilled soup recipe in the world. I discovered this Andalusian delight on holiday in Málaga, and it shook everything I thought I knew about soup right to the core. A second tasting, two years later, in a British pub in Gibraltar, was even more powerful, and prompted me to learn the recipe for myself.
TIP: Prepare the soup a day or three in advance because it improves with age.
- 100g almonds
- 4 cloves of garlic, halved
- Two to four slices of baker's crusty white bread, ideally a few days old
- Quarter pint of milk
- White wine vinegar
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Halved red grapes and croutons to serve
Soak the slices of bread in the milk. Forget about them for a moment - you want the bread to absorb as much of the milk as possible.
Now, if you bought unblanched almonds, then soak them in boiling water, fresh from the kettle, for five minutes. Drain and rub the almonds to remove the skin. They will literally pop out of their skins if you squeeze the fat end. If you bought blanched almonds, you're missing out on all that fun!
Once most of the milk has soaked into the bread, place the bread into a blender with the almonds, the garlic, a couple of tablespoons each of the vinegar and the olive oil, and add a pinch of salt. Pour in half a pint of cold water and blend until smooth. See, told you it was easy!
Add more water if you need to thin the soup out, and give it a final taste and season before transferring it into an airtight bottle. Place in the fridge. Leave for at least a couple of hours (I left mine for 18 hours before eating it.)
Serve the soup, ice cold, from small bowls, because nobody wants to be eating too much raw garlic... not before the last dance of the evening, anyway! It is traditional to halve some red grapes and place them in the serving bowls before pouring over the soup. Add croutons and stand well back!
