Things really really will be quiet around here for the next few days because I am moving from Cambridge to Brighton this week. During this time there will be a period of complete Internet “cold turkey”. Pray for me.
See ya, Tabland. I’d like to say it’s been a blast, but I’d be lying.
Tabland??!
“Tab” is Oxford Uni slang for the people of Cambridge Uni – from the medieval dog-latin “CanTABrigiensis”, meaning “of Cambridge”, I suppose. If the Uni of Edinburgh were an equivalent source of envy to Oxonians, they’d probably call its people “Burgers”, since their degrees are “Edinburgensis”.
Some of this comment is probably approximately true.
You should have appointed a locum before you buggered off, you woolly hat-wearing, patchouli-scented, finger-cymbal tinging hippy. Do you have an apple and a hunza pie wrapped in a kerchief on the end of a stick?
Hope the move goes/went well. Welcome to Sussex, where God rested on the 7th day.
Funnily enough, I believe Sussex was the last bastion of paganism in England during the initial Christian conversion (Essex was pagan at the time the archbishoprics were doled out – much earlier – which is why its capital, London, missed out on one). Of course, some traces of this heritage can still be found in the Laines, among the hemp bracelet sellers… together with the local head-f***ing Scientologists.
What’s a hunza pie?
Hippies eat hunza pie in between tinging their finger-cymbals and scratching. It’s supposed to make you live longer, but really, if you eat a lot of it, it only seeems lonnggger – admittedly not as long as wholemeal pasta, a plate of which lasts longer than the Triassic period.
Nigel Slater has a very enjoyable recipe for wholewheat pasta with sausage chunks, mustard and caramelised onions, but I take your point on a more general level.
I doubt very much that the “Tab” thing has anything to do with Oxfordian jealousy – it’s just a comic survivor, like a yard of ale. No one really cares about all that anymore except on Boat Race day, and as a child I cheered for Cambridge when I didn’t even know it had a university.
You’re all wrong about wholewheat pasta; ordinary pasta is writ on the same page as cheap white supermarket bread. The Slater recipe is delicious, but if you don’t have time just slaver some pesto on your pasta and add some feta cubes, some chopped olives, and you’re away.
Good luck in Brighton, Damian, and I can’t be the only one who’s secretly a little bit jealous..
On the wholewheat pasta question: I once came round to Claire‘s student digs when she was going through some kind of work crisis to cook her a dish based around wholewheat spaghetti and she was so disgusted with the stuff that she immediately remade it with normal spaghetti. She was right. Unless there’s been a revolution in its manufacture over the intervening few years I have to say it’s pretty nasty stuff.
I can recommend rice pasta as an alternative alternative if you know what I mean.
Rice pasta? You mean Hor Fen (‘whore fun’)? My favourite noodles.
It’s Australian made and looks like Fuselli (the pasta, not the Gothic painter). Are your noodles also known as ‘Ho Fun’?
Ho Fun – yep. Romanisation of Cantonese is a hit and miss business.
I tried to enjoy wholemeal pasta but just couldn’t, it’s awful. Any kind of pasta in a salad, even more disgusting. But pasta in a pudding (kugel?) is fab. Rice pasta? Is that the same as rice noodles? Corn pasta I thought would be foul (had to get it for non-glutinous friend) and was Ok. Faoul is Pasta and lentils (I think), and that sounds bad but tastes good. Brown rice, still not sure…
From http://www.orgran.com:
‘RICE PASTA is produced from brown rice and is ideal for stir fry and salads. This product is an excellent source of energy and is ideal for high performance athletes. It is easily digestible, assisting in the assimilation of other foods. For diabetics, it is an excellent source of carbohydrates due to the fact that only a small amount of insulin is needed to assimilate its starches. Independent studies around the world have shown that rice has been proven effective in lowering plasma cholesterol and improves the heart risk ratio by positively modifying the blood fat profile.’
Well, I dunno about all that, but it tastes pretty good to me.