Chilled Cucumber Dill Soup

This cold soup is great for the warm summer weather (aside from today's cooling trend in northern California...)
I personally love dill, and think it isn't nearly as popular as it deserves to be. Try chopping up some of the extra dill you have from this recipe and sprinkle it in a salad with a balsamic vinaigrette.

This soup is soup-er (ha ha ha) simple and only requires a few ingredients:

1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced

3 English cucumbers, 2 ½ peeled, seeded and chopped (reserve the remaining half for garnish)

3 Tablespoons fresh dill, chopped
3 cups chicken stock

½ cup Greek yogurt

Salt and pepper

Hot Sauce

In a large saucepan, saute the onion and garlic on medium heat for a few minutes.

To seed the cucumbers, peel them then cut them in half. Take a small spoon and run it down the middle of the cucumber to carve out the seeds.

Chop the cucumber into pieces about ½" thick. Don't worry too much about making sure things are evenly cut..this all ends up in a blender.

 

Add the chopped cucumber, 2 Tablespoons of dill, and chicken stock to the onions and garlic. Lightly salt and pepper. Simmer for about 20 minutes until the cucumber is soft. Feel free to add more dill than the recipe calls for if you want the taste to be stronger.

Spoon the cooked veggies into a blender, and blend until completely the mixture is smooth. (If you like your soup to have more texture, you can blend it less and leave it a little lumpy.) Unless you have an industrial sized blender or food processor, you'll probably need to do this in two batches. No photo of this part of the process because after purchasing a new, super cute pink blender off of someone on Craigslist, I realized part of the plastic is cracked, causing the liquid to leak out of the bottom of the pitcher and I'm going to need to buy a replacement part. FAIL. (Thank god the replacement part is only like $5 or I'd have a Regretsy-eque tale for this Craigslist purchase.)
Pour the soup into a large bowl and cool in the fridge. 

Add the Greek yogurt and add a few drops of hot sauce. I promise this tastes delicious, despite how gross the combination sounds. It gives the flavor a nice dynamic, and in my opinion, keeps you from having to further salt it. Garnish with fresh dill and chopped cucumber, and voila! 

I have no idea how many servings this makes, but there is definitely enough for 6 good sized bowls. 
***Note:This soup also makes for great leftovers, which can be easily made by increasing each of the ingredients a little. Happy Cooking!

Sun-Dried Tomato and Basil Muffins

Inspired by my co-worker and adapted from bowllicking.com, these savory muffins are great as a snack or a nice change from the usual piece of bread with dinner!

Yields 9 large muffins, 12 smaller muffins or 24 mini muffins

Here's what you'll need:

4 eggs

¼ cup water

1 cup plain cottage cheese (low fat is fine)

¾ cup grated Parmesan cheese

½-¾ cup almonds, coarsely ground *Pine nuts also taste great. If you have a nut allergy, sunflower seeds are also a great alternative

¼ cup all purpose flour *Gluten-Free foodies fear not! Just use a G-Free flour instead! I used Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free All Purpose Flour.

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

¼ cup sun-dried tomatoes (in oil) finely chopped

¼ cup fresh basil, finely chopped

I am not a firm believer in sticking to the recipe, so I used a Parmesan-Romano grated blend from Trader Joe's and added a bit of grated Asiago as well. 

Preheat the oven to 400° F. Grease the number of wells of a muffin tin you plan to fill.

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs and water together.

Add the cottage cheese, ½ cup cheese, flour, ground almonds (or nut/seed of choice), baking powder, salt, sun-dried tomatoes, and basil. Gently mix until combined

Spoon the batter into the muffin tins, and sprinkle with the remaining cheese.

Bake 15-18 minutes for mini and smaller muffins or 28-32 for regular sized muffins, or until golden brown and set.

Allow to cool for a minute in the tin, then remove to a cooling rack and eat warm. (I had them cold too, and found them to be just as tasty.)

 Enjoy!