Stay chill with cucumber soup

The coolest member of the humble gourd family makes a refreshingly sweet summer soup that will take the sweat out of summer and keep you hydrated in a tasty way By Louise Crosby It’s scorching in Ottawa this week. Temperatures in the 30s, lots of humidity, no breeze. Walking to the store in the middle of the afternoon, I am blasted by the heat shimmering off the sidewalk. It’s mid-summer, after all. This is how it should be.   Personally I like it. If you get the weeding and the errands done early, you can spend the hot hours reading in a cool room. Or you can take in a late afternoon movie with friends followed by dinner out, all in air-conditioned comfort, returning home in time to water the garden in the cool of the evening. Bedtime, you open the windows and put on a fan.   Times like this I make cold soup, in this case cucumber soup, chunks of market-fresh cucumber blended with plain yogurt, lots of mint and dill, hints of garlic, onion and lemon ...