👩‍🍳Shit You Should Cook About👩‍🍳

+ Rubes and I got up close and personal with FLORENCE & THE MACHINE 🧚‍♀️

OMG my besties - last night Ruby and I went to an INTIMATE FLORENCE AND THE MACHINE PERFORMANCE put on by the gorg and inspiring Emma Lewisham (if you go on their Instagram you can see us losing our minds in the front row in ALL the stories hahah.) But HOLY SHIT - I’m going to write all about it in the diary edition tomorrow (for paying supporters), but all you need to know is that she grabbed our hands & sung into our souls, and we will never ever recover. Here’s a clip to bait you into reading tomorrow’s newsy:

@_shityoushouldcareaboutFLORENCE AND THE MACHINE IS MY MOTHER #florencewelch #florenceandthemachine

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Today’s edition of the newsy is a lil dif - the bulk of it is written by our Culture Vulture cohost (and bestie) London Laura - and it’s about FOOD! I loved reading what she had to say about something that really does bring us all together, and I think you will too 🥺

PS - don’t forget to enter our Lorde competition - the winner is announced on Monday!

• Introducing… Shit You Should Cook About

• 🗺Around the world🗺

  • META is laying off 10,000 more employees & shutting down their NFT features, info on the US drone crash & San Francisco board “open” to reparations

• Do you prefer apple pie or apple crumble?

Introducing...Shit You Should Cook About

Laura is our resident ray of sunshine and co-host of Culture Vulture (our weekly pop culture podcast!) She’s a new London dweller, chief of romanticising literally everything, and will definitely ask you all what your love language is at some stage.

Hello gorgeous SYSCAhood!! Ahhh I am SO excited to share this with you this week!! But first - I just want to say that being in this newsy and on Culture Vulture with the wonderful Luce and knowing there is this incredible, kind-hearted community out there has honestly given me such a soft-place to land while I work out how on earth to navigate this new city so THANK YOU <3

Despite the recent homesickness I have started to find my feet a bit here and have the capacity to ideate again, and on a recent trip to Portugal in a green-wine-induced haze I started daydreaming about a new space that I would LOVE to share with you all. Of course, I immediately messaged Luce who was supportive and fabulous, and here we are, with Shit You Should Cook About.

Cooking a meal and gathering people around a table together is my deepest, truest love. I’ve been on a journey and a half over the years with my relationship with food, growing it, cooking it, learning about it, and crushing hard on the people who love it as much as I do (ahem - Stanley Tucci).

Years ago I made a resolution to start eating breakfast - a small but mammoth effort for me and where I was at the time. I would often get to 2pm powered on just black coffee and adrenaline under the guise that I was always “too busy” to pause to scoff down some toast (it was really just a symptom of burnout and how little I regarded looking after myself / being physically present at that time.) I also had very little cooking experience as my culinary peak was my ‘after-gig-special’ (where I’d come home sometime after midnight from working a show and make a quick dinner of ‘nachos’ - AKA ready salted crisps drizzled with ketchup and maybe a light grating from the shared flat block of cheese.) Cue a few stern words from friends, my New Year *quest,* and what began a love affair with learning to nourish my body and that of those around me; dissecting menus to replicate dishes at home, devouring food blogs and developing an obsession with my vegetable patch (inspiring a load of cliche metaphors I will without a doubt throw in here at some point). 

So I am JAZZED to share with you through the geniusly named (ty Luce) Shit You Should Cook About - a home in the newsy for meals I am loving, how to make them and of COURSE suggestions from you!!! What do you love to cook for your crush? Tell me what ingredient is a go-to in your country! Have you never gone near a spatula? Let me gently (& lovingly!) prod you towards a stove 💕

This brings me to probably one of my all-time favourite meals - inspired by the weekend of sunlight I had in Lisbon that has me dreaming of summer tomatoes - Pappa al Pomodoro. I was in Italy last summer, reading Still Life and staying in an Airbnb high up in the Tuscan hills - and it was PEAK heatwave (cooking in 44 degrees is less than ideal but I don’t think I have ever been happier to sweat). The owner of our Airbnb worked in an agriturismo up the road (a farm-to-table bed and breakfast vibe, where everything was grown on-site and you ate surrounded by olive trees aka my dream life etc etc.) We went there for dinner, I tried Pappa al Pomodoro for the first time - and then returned twice more to eat it again. Eventually, I begged his nonna to take me through how she made it and I rushed back to make it that night for the friends we were travelling with. 

🍅PAPPA AL POMODORO: THE SOUP OF THE SUMMER, BABY🍅

Essentially an alt tomato soup, Pappa al Pomodoro is a Tuscan staple that evolved from times when food was scarce and bread was ample (and therefore so were the uses for it.) Trust me - it may not look like, much but it tastes of Italian summer 🌞

To make, pop a pan on medium heat and gently cook off some chopped garlic, one diced onion and a sprinkle of chilli flakes - not necessary if you’re spice averse -  in a good glug of oil (olive if you have it). Add in about 2 cups of chopped fresh or tinned tomatoes, with a dash of balsamic vinegar and mix in half a cup of torn, crusty bread. The bread needs to be semi-stale to not just go soggy/baby food vibes, so dry it out in the oven if you are short on time!

Season generously with salt and pepper and tear in some fresh basil - or whatever herb you have on hand! Cook until the bread starts to break down, soaking up the tomatoes and all the garlicky oil and you have a tomatoey-stew on your hands. Ladle into a bowl and marvel at your extremely chic, summery soup.  If you are feeding a crowd, serve with zucc pasta (recipe here from my true love, Stanley Tucci himself) and a non-negotiable aperol spritz.

Belissmo xxx

PS, drop ur fave recipes in the comments below!! xx

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🗺Around The World🗺

Online/ IRL

META is laying off 10,000 more employees (NBC)

EEK layoff szn continues, and META continues to make headlines about it. The company has just announced that they’ll be laying off another 10,000 employees (that’s after their initial 11,000 layoffs in November.) Yeesh.

Meta winds down support for NFTs on Instagram and Facebook (TechCrunch)

Who saw this coming? I did! I will give it to Meta - they test and test and test new shit - and sometimes that new shit doesn’t work out. Like trying to incorporate NFTs into their products.

This short-lived product only began testing with select Instagram creators last May, plus some Facebook users in June. By July, Meta expanded NFT support on Instagram for creators in 100 countries. Less than a year later, Meta is moving on from NFTs.

Europe

US drone crashes after encounter with Russian jet (BBC)

Reuters @Reuters

Here’s a closer look at the MQ-9 ‘Reaper’ drone, the U.S. air force aircraft that was downed in the Black Sea reut.rs/3Lqh3JN

The other day a Russian fighter jet collided with a US drone, causing it to crash into the Black Sea. The US say that the drone was on a “routine mission in international airspace when two Russian jets tried to intercept it” (naturally Moscow denies these claims.)

More on this story here!

US

San Francisco board open to reparations with $5M payouts (NBC)

“Payments of $5 million to every eligible Black adult, the elimination of personal debt and tax burdens, guaranteed annual incomes of at least $97,000 for 250 years and homes in San Francisco for just $1 a family.

These were some of the more than 100 recommendations made by a city-appointed reparations committee tasked with the thorny question of how to atone for centuries of slavery and systemic racism.

And the San Francisco Board of Supervisors hearing the report for the first time Tuesday voiced enthusiastic support for the ideas listed, with some saying money should not stop the city from doing the right thing.”

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Today’s mundane poll:

I’m sticking with the food theme here sooooooo:

• To get my Friday diary entry, a whole bunch of links and recommendations, and Bel’s Sunday morning newsy ‘No News Is Good News’ become a paying supporter 💌