This is a wonderful, refreshing cold soup for hot weather.
Minced raisins add sweetness, walnuts add a subtle crunch, and cucumbers and dill cool and freshen.
The original recipe is from Marian Burros in her “Pure & Simple” cookbook. She was a food columnist for The New York Times from 1981–2014, and before that at The Washington Post. I have made many of her recipes over the years and always loved the results.
I strongly recommend using Pavel’s whole milk yogurt. It is available at Staff of Life. I don’t think you can beat its flavor. It is made in the Bay Area in San Leandro and comes in low-fat, whole milk and organic versions.
They have a new label but still use the same recipe that began with Pavel Malcoff, who learned to make yogurt on a dairy farm in Siberia in 1894. He fought on the losing side of the Russian Revolution and had to escape to Shanghai, where he worked at a dairy. Yogurt is widely consumed in China today.
Malcoff left China and moved to Brazil, where he managed a cattle ranch. There he met a retired American teacher and moved with her to San Francisco, where he worked at Del Monte Foods. He retired at 75 and, wanting to stay busy, began making the same yogurt in 1970 that he had made back in Siberia and China. He never advertised, instead relying on person-to-person recommendations like I’m doing here.
Pavel’s is thinner in consistency than most yogurts, so you won’t need to add a lot of water, just enough to make it soupy. If you use English or Persian cucumbers, you don’t need to peel them first. This is a very light soup and can be served with pita bread, hummus or black olive tapenade.
