The Mean Lady doesn’t just torture my body and recommend which brand of condoms a newly single lady should use. She’s multi-talented and for a year has been on me to try this great recipe for watermelon gazpacho from the pages of Bon Appetit. So the other day, I had Mia come over to teach her how easy it is to make something that looks stunning, tastes divine and is actually good for you. This is my take on the recipe Mean Lady provided.

The shopping list:

1 seedless watermelon
1 medium cucumber
1 red Serrano pepper or green jalapeno pepper
1 red bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper
1 bunch celery
Fresh mint
1 bunch flat leaf parsley
Shallot or red onion
Three good-sized limes
Red wine vinegar
Plain Greek yogurt, creme fraiche or sour cream, or a soy alternative for a vegan recipe

Start with 5 cups of diced watermelon, 1 cup of it set aside and diced kind of small and very neatly. Puree 4 cups and set aside.

Peel, seed and dice a medium sized cucumber. If you use an English cucumber, or other variety that has a thin skin and few if any seeds, you can simply dice it. Make the dice pretty small — maybe an eighth of an inch cubes at the largest.

Finely dice the shallot or about a half a small red onion. You want about a quarter to half a cup of diced matter, whichever you choose. Do the same with the bell peppers, and finely mince the hot pepper. Be sure to de-seed and de-vein all of them particularly the hot pepper. If you leave the seeds and membranes in, you’ll end up with something much spicier. Finely chop the inner third of the bunch of celery — the stuff that’s yellowish green, including the leaves; about a quarter cup of mint and a similar amount of the parsley. Add all of this to the pureed watermelon.

Juice the limes — you need about three tablespoons of lime juice. It might take two, maybe three depending on the size and juiciness. Stir in the lime juice and two tablespoons of red wine vinegar to the soup mixture, and add salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate for at least an hour. Serve with a dollop of the yogurt/creme fraiche/sour cream and some mint sprigs.

You can have a lot of fun with this recipe. Add more cucumber and less watermelon if you have a particularly sweet melon. Add some finely diced jicima in place of half a cup of the diced watermelon. Substitute cilantro for the parsley and mint. Sprinkle crumbled feta on in place of the dollop of yogurt/creme fraiche/sour cream. Want a jolt of something more adult? Add some white rum to taste before you serve it.

Great recipe, Mean Lady. And easy too, right Mia?