full moon clichés
hi & welcome back to FAX ME HARDER !! It’s the first day of December and the last day of UK lockdown (the second one, if u hadn’t heard) and I’m making creamy prawny lemony garlicky tagliatelle tonight to celebrate all the above (though actually it is more like all the above should be celebrating creamy prawny lemony garlicky tagliatelle because the pasta is significantly superior to December 1st and lockdown’s conclusion.). The recipe is from Dolly Alderton, who is the only other person I’ve ever come across that truly loves Camden (for all its misdemeanours) as much as I do, and I have trawled back through literally hundreds of her photos on Instagram - vignettes of whole years - to find the picture of her prawny pasta many many times. She’d served it in a massive bowl in the middle of her table, in her flat in the centre of Camden, guitar in the background and wine in shot (this may not even be true - it’s just how I remember it. Sometimes it’s nicer that way, u know?), candles lit, with tongs for her friends to drape the ribbons of pasta onto their plates. It made me feel something like nostalgia, but for a situation I’d not yet had. Longing? I definitely wanted to make my friends prawny pasta around my table at my flat in Camden. I couldn’t yet cook and I didn’t yet have a flat in Camden with the space for a table, but my feeling for it was real. This newsletter is a special one - it’s the first one with a poem in !!! I hope u love or maybe even loathe it, but I hope it makes u feel a little somethin (it can be hard to feel a little somethin when it’s dark at 3.30pm) <3
It’s starting to feel like Christmas, if I almost dare say it, though this year’s xmas is decidedly different to the ones before it. I was walking home from the overground station earlier listening to LCD Soundsystem (I think this is the third out of four newsletters that LCD have featured in tbh - I’m obsessed with the despair nestling in the joy of their music, and that juxtaposition pretty much always sums up what I’m trying to get across) and I had this unnerving feeling of excitement growing in my chest. It was cold and dark and the streetlights were truly twinkling (they were, I swear) and you know that kind of night where it feels like it’s misty but it isn’t? It’s almost just the presence of mist? Like a scene out of A Christmas Carol, but from the book not the film so you have to imagine it yourself. And I had synths in my ears and my cold hands in my pockets and I felt so excited for no tangible reason that it unnerved me. I felt it physically in my chest too, like a cliché out of a coming of age movie, looking around at the black sky and trying not to scream out loud. I don’t know what it means but it means something, I think (?). It’s a full moon atm, and I’m having prawny pasta for tea. The curtains are closed and there’s 2 candles lit and I bought a new pan from the big Sainsbury’s. I’m drinking a cup of tea. I’m wearing novelty xmas socks. I think it’s maybe all going to be ok.
(Mortal Trash, u guys, is my favourite ever poetry collection, by Kim Addonizio)
Creamy prawny lemony garlicky tagliatelle (from Dolly Alderton):
INGREDIENTS (my version serves 2):
dried tagliatelle
cream (single or double, depends how decadent you’re feeling. Also did you know Elmlea isn’t actual dairy cream? I couldn’t believe it. It’s the gold standard as far as I’m concerned)
1/2 lemon
several handfuls of rocket or spinach
parmesan
1 chilli (that’s half per person, but taste it and see how spicy first. u want it a bit spicy but not the defining feature of the dish)
three cloves of garlic
handful of parsley
salt n peps (obv)
raw king prawns (I use the whole pack because I love them)
Thinly slice chilli & crush and finely chop the garlic. Put it in a large frying pan on medium-low heat with delicious olive oil to cook gently. Fry for about 4 mins then add the prawns. Put the pasta in to cook, cause this is a quick 1 ! Cook the prawns until nice & pink all the way through, then add in half the carton of cream, the juice of the half a lemon, salt and peps to taste and stir ASAP. Add the rocket and the parsley right before you drain the pasta, then add that too and toss it with the sauce, in the frying pan. Garnish with parsley and grated parmesan - I know it’s not trad to eat fish with cheese but parmesan and pasta? Come on plz.
xxx