Foodie Friday--Guest Post Hot Summer = Cold Soup

Today I'm welcoming a cohort of author Lynne Silver's, Marlena, who is sharing one of her delicious, and previously Top Secret recipes! Not sure how Lynne gets these secretive types to open up, but I'm glad she does. For more insider dish (and I mean that in every sense of the word!) make sure you check out Lynne's Heated Match, book one in the Coded For Love series, available now from Ellora's Cave.

Summer in the mid-Atlantic gets hot. It’s very muggy and unpleasantly humid and hot. I want to minimize my hours spent standing over the hot stove, and my boys prefer light refreshing meal options. You see, I’m the head of food services at the Program. A few weeks ago, I couldn’t tell you where I worked, but since the Program was recently featured in every newspaper thanks to a leak, I got the go-ahead from Commander Shepard to hop on some blogs and share some of my favorite recipes.

I’m required to make three squares a day for nearly 200 people, most of them genetically enhanced soldiers. They burn through a lot of calories a day in their training and I have to provide healthful filling meals. My boys (that’s what I call the soldiers) can’t get enough of my gazpacho.

When I first made it, I got a lot of pushback. They told me it was too cold, too girly, too this, too that. But then they tried it. Now I make it every Tuesday, June through September.  Here’s what I do

Ingredients:

-          3-4 cucumbers

-          2-3 tomatoes

-          2 stalks celery

-          Half a red pepper (use a hot pepper if you like spicy)

-          Handful of basil leaves

-          3 T balsamic vinegar

-          Crushed garlic clove

-          3T olive oil

-          Kosher salt to taste

-          Tomato juice (I like the Whole Foods 365 glass bottle)

Directions:

Peel & seed the cucumber, toss it in a good blender or food processer. Add all the veggies and oil/vinegar and grind until it’s a thick puree. Transfer the mass to a large glass bowl. Pour in tomato juice until it’s the consistency you want. Chill then serve.

Enjoy! From Marlena

Heated Match

Blurb:

A lead byline and a cover story were what journalist Loren Stanton wanted most. Until she meets genetically enhanced soldier, Adam Blacker. Team leader of a top-secret covert ops group, Adam never wanted to search for his genetic match, but whenever he gets close to Loren, things turn hot quickly, making him forget every reason he had for retaining his bachelor status. After a scorching night together, neither is in any doubt they are connected at the DNA-deep level, although both fear the high stakes of what it means to be together.

Loren gives Adam two weeks to prove he is bred for more than war. He must show he is coded for love.