You don’t have to sweat over the stove this summer.

The best cure for a cold is hot soup and Panadol. The best cure for the crushing heat of summer is cold soup, a cool lavender bath, and a good lie down with Vanity Fair.

One of my favourite cold soups for summer is gazpacho. The best of the season’s ingredients are whirled into one knockout dish. Fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, and green capsicum combine to form a coolly addictive elixir (pictured). There are quick versions of this Spanish soup on the internet, as well as more sophisticated ones. They’re all dead easy. Gazpacho requires no cooking, so even the most stove-shy of cooks should give it a go.

I could easily eat a bowl of this stuff the size of my head, but it’s also effective in much smaller doses. Serve it as an appetiser at a barbeque, or an amuse-bouche in a shot glass, with or without vodka.

It also keeps really well, so make a big batch when a heatwave is about to hit. It’s a lifesaving tonic on those 40° dog days when you can barely think, let alone think about cooking.

Greek and Middle Eastern cuisines are another intelligent approach to summer. Lots of small dishes served cold or lightly fried will keep both the kitchen and temper a few degrees cooler. Tzatziki and beetroot dips with flatbread, dolmades, freshly made felafel balls with hummus, lightly fried or barbequed calamari, and grilled haloumi cheese served with slices of tomato, fresh basil and lemon wedges are all easily made and work in any combination. Making hummus from scratch requires patience and a food processor. A novice can do it and the results will be knockout compared to the stuff you buy.

Middle Eastern salads are many and varied, and the perfect way to eat a combination of flavours and textures in one meal. Perfect served with barbequed lamb.

Salads don’t have to be a side dish. A construct-it-yourself Caesar salad night involves no more effort than frying some bacon, lightly poaching some eggs and washing some cos lettuce. The rest can be bought ready-to-go.

For the slightly more adventurous it might involve shaving some parmesan and making the croutons and dressing instead of buying them, and maybe grilling some chicken marinated in lemon and garlic on the barbeque.

Serving three or four salads together actually makes for a decent meal, believe it or not.

Many Japanese dishes are served cold and with a beer in hand form the perfect defence against summer’s cruellest conditions. If you feel like making sushi and sashimi at home, use only the freshest ‘sashimi-quality’ salmon and tuna available. If it’s a stinking hot day, take a little esky to the fishmonger with you.

When eating out while the mercury rises, choose a place with water views. There’s no better time to enjoy Southbank and Docklands, St.Kilda and Port Melbourne, Williamstown and Geelong than in summer.  Enjoy the best of the state’s seafood with a snappy sauvignon blanc or pinot noir before retreating home to your summer prescription of a cool lavender bath and Vanity Fair.

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