Chilled cucumber soup is refreshing on a summer day, made with Greek yogurt, cucumbers, and mint. Perfect for cooling off, it’s a light and easy way to stay satiated and comfortable.
Adapted from Perla Servan-Schreiber | Enjoy: Recipes for Memorable Gatherings | Flammarion, 2020
Summertime calls for breezy meals that are easy to prep. This soup fits the bill. The walnuts are a wonderful addition to this soup, adding protein, fiber, and heart-healthy fats including omega-3 fatty acids. And if you like yogurt, you’ll love this!–Perla Servan-Schreiber
☞ Contents
Chilled Cucumber Soup
Ingredients
- 2 large (2 1/2 pounds) cucumbers*
- 2 level teaspoons Guérande sea salt or kosher salt
- 1 to 1 1/2 cups (9 to 13 ounces) plain whole milk or Greek yogurt
- Whole milk
- 4 medium (1 pound) Roma tomatoes (optional) peeled
- 6 scallions (optional)
- 10 walnut halves (optional)
- 3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh cilantro
- 3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh mint
Directions
- Set a fine-mesh strainer over a bowl. Wash and peel the cucumbers, leaving a few strips of skin. Cut the cucumbers in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds with a spoon, and slice 1/8 inch thick (3 mm).
- Place the slices in the strainer to collect the juice. Sprinkle the cucumbers with the salt, place a weight on top to press it down, and let sit for 15 minutes so the excess liquid drains out.
☞TESTER TIP: You can use a resealable plastic bag filled with water as a weight or place a small plate on the cucumbers and top with a heavy can.
- In a serving bowl, whisk the yogurt until smooth. Stir in the cucumber juice. Rinse and drain the cucumber slices, mix them into the yogurt. Add more whisked yogurt or whole milk to achieve your desired consistency. Chill for at least 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile, if using tomatoes, cut them in half, remove the seeds, and dice finely. Rinse the scallions, if using, and slice thinly. Roughly chop the walnuts, if using.
- When ready to serve, stir the cilantro and mint into the chilled soup. Serve immediately with the optional tomatoes, scallions, and walnuts in separate bowls to allow everyone to garnish their soup to taste.
Notes
*What kind of cucumbers should I use in this soup?
English cucumbers, also known as hothouse cucumbers, are perfect here. They’re the longer cucumbers that are seedless, slightly sweeter, and have much thinner skin than other varieties. If you end up using slicing pickles (the kind with dark and waxy thick skin), start by peeling them, then remove the seeds and chop from there.Show Nutrition
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Recipe Testers’ Reviews
This chilled cucumber soup is a lovely cool refreshing soup. The cold yogurt and the cool cucumber and mint flavors are very refreshing and cool your palate with a spicy meal. We had this alongside a spicy Indian curry and it complemented it nicely. I highly recommend the optional toppings of tomato, scallion and nuts. I didn’t have walnuts and used slivered almonds which gave a nice bit of crunch.
What a delightful chilled cucumber soup. So delightful that after tasting it, I decided to serve it as dessert after a pasta meal. This would be wonderful as a starter, or salad with spicy food, or served on a spoon as a palate cleanser. I served mine in my patio margarita cups… just to practice for patio weather!
I opted to keep the soup green so I omitted the walnuts and Roma tomatoes. What I did add was a sliver of a pickled hot pepper as the soup reminded me of a cucumber ceviche. I used fleur de sel as the salt and sliced the cucumber into 2 mm thickness. I found the slight dehydration of the cucumber to provide a pleasurable chew with still a bit of crispiness. The addition of a sliver of heat, the tanginess of the yogurt, and the freshness of the herbs, made my tastebuds sing. My only suggestion is that if using the scallions and the yogurt volume is 300 ml or less, 2 tablespoons of each of the greens would suffice.
HUNGRY FOR MORE?
If you make this recipe, snap a photo and hashtag it #LeitesCulinaria. We'd love to see your creations on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Jennifer Mallock
This chilled cucumber soup is perfect for summer. It’s refreshing, herbal, light, and completely satisfying. I wasn’t sure what the tomatoes, scallions, and nuts would bring to the party but I really enjoyed them mixed into the soup.
Super convenient – this recipe comes together quickly, uses ingredients that are easy to find, and doesn’t heat up the kitchen! And you can prep most of the recipe and clean up while the cucumber-yogurt mixture is chilling.
Depending on how much yogurt you use, this could be a creamy salad or a soup. Mine ended up somewhere in the middle and everyone loved it. I’ll add more mint next time as I’m quite fond of it. We substituted pecans for the walnuts. They were delish. I’ll be making this all summer long.