Cold Cucumber Soup with Shrimp and Pickled Onions Recipe

Even though the weather outside is getting a bit more chilly, a refreshing cold soup is still sure to satisfy. A flavorful cucumber soup meets sweet and buttery shrimp and zesty pickled onions to create a seemingly complex, but truly simple dish that will leave your dinner party guests standing in awe.

Cold Cucumber Soup with Shrimp and Pickled Onions

The Pickled Onions:

I absolutely adore pickled onions. I believe they should be a pantry staple and are an ingredient that will spice up any dish that is lacking that certain oomph. They are so simple to make and can be stored in the fridge anywhere from 2-3 weeks. In that case, they are the perfect accompaniment to any dish, a phenomenal taco topper, or even a great snack(don’t judge). When pickling onions, I particularly prefer to use red wine vinegar. Red wine vinegar is red wine that is fermented until it goes sour. This gives the onions a more fruity and robust taste, which I really enjoy. Pickled onions work particularly well in this cold cucumber soup dish. The soup itself is quite rich due to the addition of Greek yogurt and shrimp cooked in loads of butter and the perfect counter balance to richness is acidity, and these pickled onions pack a punch. Their tanginess and zestiness provide a much wanted note of acidity and they elevate this simple soup dish to another culinary dimension.

The Cold Cucumber Soup:

This cucumber soup recipe is very simple. A few cucumbers, a little Greek yogurt, and some spices go straight into a blender, and bang you have a delicious soup. The thing about this recipe is that every ingredient plays a very important role. The cucumbers are the star and give the soup a wonderful refreshing taste. The Greek yogurt provides necessary richness and acidity and acts as a thickener for the soup. Parsley provides an herbaceous note which complements the cucumber and Greek yogurt beautifully. Lemon zest and lemon juice provide some more acidity and give the soup freshness, while the garlic brings pungency and an amazing aroma. Now the keys to this dish are the spices. Let’s begin with the coriander. Coriander is a spice commonly used in Latin-American and Indian cooking. It has a mellow citrus taste and has mild nutty notes. Cumin, on the other hand, is a lot more pungent and has warm and earthy qualities. Cumin is also very commonly used in Latin-America and India, but is also very popular in the Middle East. Both of these spices help enhance the tastes of the other ingrdients, as well as, give the soup a deep and complex flavor. This soup uses common ingredients that anyone could find at their local grocery store, however, the harmony of flavors formed when these ingredients are combined is truly spectacular.

The Shrimp:

Cooking shrimp to perfection is no easy task. Once on the stove, shrimp cook very fast and turn from soft to rubbery in the blink of an eye. Therefore, I like to cook shrimp on a very low heat in lots of fat to prevent even the slightest possibility of burning. In this recipe I cook the shrimp in butter and mix the shrimp constantly while cooking. Cooking in butter allows the internal temperature of the shrimp to increase slowly, allowing for better control over the cooking of the shrimp. Perfectly cooked shrimp are delicious. They are beautifully juicy, rich, buttery, and sweet and I forgot to mention irresistible.

Cucumber Soup, Shrimp, Pickled Onions, They work so well together:

Not the most ordinary of combinations, but something about the mix of sweet, buttery shrimp, cold cucumber soup, and tangy pickled red onions is just special. They all blend together very well and complement each other perfectly. Nothing about this dish is necessarily extravagant, but the use of simple, high-quality ingredients creates a genuinely flavorful and delicious soup.