Why the tomato matters so much in a cold gazpacho

Gazpacho is five ingredients. The tomato is four of them in effect. At Fervores, the gazpacho is made every morning and the recipe does not change, but the dish changes every week depending on what the tomatoes are doing.

The Vega de Granada in summer ¶

The Vega de Granada is the flat agricultural plain that surrounds the city. It has been farmed continuously for centuries and produces some of the best tomatoes in Andalusia in July and August, when the combination of high daytime heat and cool nights from the Sierra Nevada creates a concentration of flavour that is hard to replicate elsewhere.

The tomatoes Gonzalo buys at the Mercado de San Agustin come from a grower in the Vega who has been selling at the same stall for many years. They are not a named variety. They are what the grower calls 'de palo', meaning grown on a stake rather than a wire, which tends to produce a denser, meatier fruit.

The recipe and its variables ¶

The Fervores gazpacho is tomato, a small amount of green pepper, a little garlic, sherry vinegar, Montefrio olive oil, and water. It is blended cold, strained twice through a fine sieve, and chilled for at least two hours before service. The proportions are fixed. The result is not, because the tomatoes are not.

In a good week, the gazpacho needs very little vinegar and the oil floats on top in a way that looks almost deliberate. In a difficult week, the balance requires more adjustment. Gonzalo tastes it every morning before service and makes small corrections. The goal is always the same: cold, clean, and tasting of the tomato rather than of the seasoning.

Why it is served in a bowl and not a glass ¶

Gazpacho served in a glass is a tapa. Gazpacho served in a wide, shallow bowl with a small cube of day-old bread is a first course. The bowl format slows the eating down and lets the temperature rise slightly from the first spoonful to the last, which changes the flavour. The bread cube is there to give the hands something to do and to absorb the last of the liquid.

The gazpacho is 7 EUR and it is on the menu every evening from June through September. After that, the tomatoes from the Vega are no longer what they were, and the dish comes off the menu until the following summer.