Cucumber Tomato Onion Salad

The pool schedule picked up this week — a heat wave across the Chicago metro pushed everyone outside and into the water. I sat in the chair for seven hours on Friday with a water bottle I kept refilling at the fountain because the heat was serious, the flat hard heat that makes the asphalt shimmer. I ate my lunch in the shade on the bench by the snack bar: a turkey sandwich on wheat bread from home, an apple, a bag of pretzels from the vending machine because I forgot to pack a snack. Seven dollars for the vending machine pretzels. Tragic.

The blog got a comment this week that caught me. A woman in Minnesota wrote: "I found your rice and beans post and made it three times this month. I'm a single mom on food stamps and your recipes are the first ones that don't make me feel bad about what I can afford." I read it three times. Then I wrote a response and then deleted it and wrote a new one and posted it. What do you say to that? Thank you feels small. But also: thank you. For being the reason I am writing these things down.

Made gazpacho this week — the blender kind, with a pound of very ripe tomatoes that were on sale at Jewel for a dollar twenty, a cucumber, half a red onion, a green pepper, garlic, red wine vinegar, olive oil. Blended it all smooth, chilled it for three hours. Cold tomato soup in the middle of a heat wave is basically medicine. Total cost about two fifty for six servings.

Ate it for lunch three days running with bread and cheese. The blog readers keep asking for more cheap summer recipes and I keep writing them down: what I cook, what it costs, how it tastes. It turns out that cooking on nothing and writing about it honestly is a thing that people need. That is not nothing. That is something, actually.

The same tomatoes I blended into gazpacho are the ones in this salad — a dollar twenty for a pound at Jewel, the kind that are almost too ripe to wait. When a reader tells you your recipes are the first ones that don’t make her feel bad about what she can afford, you want to keep writing down every last thing that costs almost nothing and tastes like it shouldn’t. This salad is one of those things: cucumber, tomato, onion, a little vinegar, done. No heat required, which on a week like this one is the whole point.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 25 minutes (includes 15 min rest) | Servings: 6

Ingredients

1 lb ripe tomatoes, diced (about 2–3 medium)
1 large cucumber, halved lengthwise and sliced
1/2 medium red onion, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon fresh or dried parsley (optional)

Instructions

Prep the vegetables. Dice the tomatoes into rough 1/2-inch chunks and place in a large bowl. Halve the cucumber lengthwise, slice into half-moons about 1/4 inch thick, and add to the bowl. Thinly slice the red onion and add it in.
Dress the salad. Drizzle the red wine vinegar and olive oil over the vegetables. Sprinkle with salt and black pepper. Toss gently until everything is evenly coated.
Rest before serving. Let the salad sit at room temperature for 10–15 minutes so the vegetables release their juices and the flavors come together. Taste and adjust salt or vinegar as needed.
Serve. Serve at room temperature or chilled. Garnish with parsley if using. Goes well with crusty bread, cheese, or alongside any grilled protein.

Nutrition (per serving)

Cucumber Tomato Onion Salad — The Same Ingredients That Saved My Summer