MIKEY BELL

I have started every single email this week with ‘Hope you’re coping with this heat,’ and the gag is, I am not.

Well, I am, in the sense of I love the sun on my skin and I love how a sunny day makes me feel. Like I suddenly become someone who is absolutely dumbfounded by how glorious it feels to get the laundry dried so quickly. Grass looks greener. I suddenly care about birds and bugs having access to clean water and feeding. I stared at pigeon for about seven whole minutes yesterday, just bathing itself in our bird bath, and I thought ‘Yes. This is why we’re living.’

And I do enjoy sunbathing.

Not too much though, I’m still militant about SPF and reading in the shade for much longer than I would ever sunbathe, but I do think a little splash of sun on the skin is healing. Healing for the soul and spirit, of course, because otherwise it does nothing but bleach out the colour of books and threaten our health but you know… moderation is lovely here.

Side note, and I am not a dermatologist by far but I do absolutely love skin care and adore talking about it, and so with the sun being as loud and as proud as it is lately, can we talk skin care for a second?

You can like food and looking after your skin at the same time, right?

I once read that the best skin care advice for someone in their forties is to wear SPF in their thirties. Now, before you say anything, watch your mouth, because I am not forty just yet but I am (just over) my midi-thirties so have absorbed this advice like it came from a navy sergeant.

So alongside being stringent with my sunbathing, and being evangelic about a good, high SPF, I also use a good vitamin C serum UNDER my SPF. It’s an anti-axidant for the skin and helps neutralise the ‘radicals’ (absolutely love that word) that are generated by sun exposure, so vitamin C under SPF work together stunningly and provide better protection from pigmentation iin the future.

Fab, right? 

Also, I like to keep a face mist in the fridge. In hot weather I am constantly reapplying SPF and then spraying my face with a cool, fresh-from-the-fridge mist that is packed with barrier protecting ingredients (like ceramides). It won’t protect you from the sun, but will work lovely with vitamin C and SPF to keep your skin bouncy and hydrated.

Okay. Are you all still here?

When did this become a GOOP blog?

Anyway, let’s get back to food.

So, even with the joy of the pigeon bathing and my pigmentation-protected skin, sometimes the sun has the capacity to give me depressing thoughts about other things, important things, like food. When my eyelids are hot and heavy and I can feel a small puddle of cold sweat on the bottom of the back, the last thing I want to do is cook.

What I want is cold, crunchy vegetables dipped into creamy, garlic and dill heavy yogurt. I want juice-logged, thick triangles of watermelon scattered with a little sea salt. I want a clean pitcher of Bloody Mary so cold it hurts me throat and so spicy it’ll launch me into orbit. I don’t want to be stood at the stove over another source of heat.

But alas, my craving for pasta means I must.

There’s a sprightliness to this pasta, with the sharp, uplifting citrus burst in the sauce, and the buckwheat is gentle and doesn’t make me want to have a lie down afterwards (the sun will do that on it’s own). However, it’s still heart and satisfying, which is due to the nutty, rustic flavour of the pasta paired with the confident garlicky and Parmesan dressing.

The secret to keeping this meal from tasting just like garlicky pasta is to cook the courgettes for as long they need. What I mean by that is, a raw-ish or partly cooked courgette is nice, don’t get me wrong, but here I want them golden and sometimes burnished in parts, which make them strangely both crunchy and melt-in-the-mouth at the same time? They go quite… rich and cheesy, in a weird way?

Cooking them for a decent amount of time also means that the courgette juices seep into the oil, which when paired with garlic and lemon, creates a scant but powerful, gleaming oily sauce (more of a dressing) for the pasta. 

It’s perfect for a summery dinner in five-thousand degree heat while we wait for a cold breeze.

A few things before we begin:

Courgettes – I use one small to medium sized courgette to feed two, but I recently found baby courgettes in the supermarket and they are so cute and gorgeous and so perfect for this. I’d say two to three baby courgettes per person for this. Fewer seeds and water in them too, so they kind of hold their size and shape as they cook.

Courgettes (Part II) – Don’t half-arse them and cook until they’re just hot. Don’t only take them to slightly golden. You want them browned, which might take you a little longer than you think.

Other vegetables – I haven’t made this with other vegetables. Let’s just get that out of the way, but I’d imagine it would be lovely with asparagus. They won’t need as much time cooking as courgettte and the finished product will be… I guess little crunchier than the creamy fall-apartness of courgettes, but lovely still. Some thinly sliced leeks would also be gorgeous. Instead of or alongside the courgettes, actually. I guess a handful of frozen peas thrown into the last six minutes of the pasta cooking time would also be fab…

Pasta – I went for a buckwheat linguine because it bloats me less, but any pasta would be good. Of course linguine, but a spaghetti would be good. Tagliatelle would be a bit thick for my liking for such a thin pasta sauce (if we can even call it that), but if it’s all you have, go for it. There’s a world where this would be amazing with orzo, too. But I only like orzo, really, when it’s like… cold? Like a pasta salad, which this could be if you left it to go cold and ate it the next stirred, possibly stirred through with a little olive oil to loosen the grains?

Pasta (Part II) – if you go with buckwheat, like I suggest, then as with courgettes, buckwheat takes longer to cook than you think. Ignore what the packet says. Those packets have lied for so long. Just cook them until they are soft, which could take anything between 11 – 13 minutes. One day I think I’m going to write a piece about my feelings on pasta being al dente… because I have opinions…

Garlic – I used normal garlic but I bought smoked garlic the other day and I think it would be wonderful here? Changes the dish to something more rounded, less fresh and crisp, and more smoky and rich? Sounds good to me.

Oil – I call for flavourless oil with this because the garlic, lemon, courgettes, chilli flakes are doing the heavy lifting with the flavours so olive oil isn’t always necessary. Plus… have you seen the price of olive oil lately? Absurd. So I’m only reaching for it when it’s necessary, tbh, and we use quite a bit of oil in this recipe so want you to be mindful of spending those pennies. But if it’s all you have and you have no concern, use the olive oil, God damn it.

Cheese – I chose Parmesan because I wanted it to add a gritty body to the sauce, but this would be fab without the Parmesan and instead just had some salty, tangy feta cheese crumbled over the finished meal. Don’t use cheddar here, it won’t melt the way you think it will.

Finally, I know standing over a pan of oil doesn’t sound like a sunny day activity but we think nothing of standing over a barbecue?

And this is quicker, lighter and easier?

Not that I’m trying to fight my case to make it, it’s very easy and the payoff is delicious, but when you’re boiling hot and knackered, I know cooking can take some convincing. But we all have to eat, and if eating this is calm, simple, fresh, and perfect for a sunny day, then the short amount of time we need to be fussing over a hob will pay off in the long run.

Serves 2

1 medium courgette

6 – 7 tablespoons rapeseed oil (or other flavourless oil, but olive oil would be perfectly fine too)

200g buckwheat linguine

1 clove garlic

1 lemon

½ tsp dried chilli flakes

30g Parmesan – plus extra to serve

A handful of fresh parsley – finely chopped

1. First, slice the courgette as thinly as you can. A mandolin would be great if you can be bothered to get it out of the cupboard you hide it in, but otherwise a knife is fine. But you do, I insist, need them as thin as poss.
2. Put some kitchen paper or a sheet of baking paper on a tray or a plate or a chopping board, for the courgettes later.
3. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. You want the oil to coat the pan so if you need more, use more. Add the courgette slices and try your best to space them apart so they sit in a single layer so that they fry rather than steam. This will go out the window once we start stirring so just try your best.
4. Keep them there for like… 6-7 minutes, sizzling away, and then start turning them over to cook on the other side. This is when overlapping will likely happen, in which case, try and separate them and do your best. Cook for another 6-7… you just have to keep cooking them until they are bronzed and crispy looking. Constant flipping will stop a crust forming so do, in good faith, give them a chance, but keep your temperature at medium, even lower if needed. Don’t be tempted to whack the heat up for speed because they’ll burn too quickly.
5. When they’re browned, lift them carefully from the pan with a slotted spoon and place them on the baking paper or kitchen paper, avoiding any overlapping, and leave the slick of oily, green liquor in the pan. Salt and pepper the courgette generously but thoughtfully.
6. Now, cook the buckwheat pasta. You know the drill. Big pan, boiling water, lots of salt, salty like the sea, blah blah, put the pasta in the pan. Cook for much longer than the packet says because it takes much longer than normal pasta. I think so anyway.
7. While the pasta cooks, return to your pan of green courgette oil and put on a gentle heat. Grate in the garlic clove, the zest of the lemon and then halve it it and squeeze in the juice (mind the pips). Add a little chilli flake, the Parmesan, and stir gently, allowing everything to mingle together. The cheese won’t melt necessarily, but will go fuzzy and fizzy with the garlic, which is fab. Allow everything to cook gently and mellow on a low heat while the pasta cooks, stirring now and then. Don’t turn up the heat because we don’t want the garlic to burn.
8. When the pasta is soft, drain it, but not before reserving just a few tablespoons of the pasta cooking water. Add this water to the pan of lemony, garlicky dressing, gently throw in the pasta, and toss everything together until the pasta is fully coated.
9. Tip in the courgette slices (reserving a few slices) and sprinkle over some grated parsley, tossing again to disperse the parsley and courgette.
10. Divide between two bowls, add the reserved courgettes to the top of the pasta, and then finish with more parsley, Parmesan, and plenty of black pepper. Scrape any juice leftover from the pan on top. Leave nothing behind.
11. Eat it outside, wearing your vitamin C and SPF and find a pigeon bathing itself and remind yourself that life is wonderful. If you skipped the intro, this may baffle you. That’ll teach you to not just skip straight to the recipe.