Trip to the Gyp: Pink Week Edition

This week is Cambridge Pink Week, and students up and down Cambridge are raising awareness and money for breast cancer charities. In honour of this, The Tab brings you a special edition of Trip to the Gyp, with food that is exclusively pink. They do all taste really good too!

Pink Pasta

This classic pasta sauce is really easy and perfect if you’re in a rush in the evening.  This version is simpler than some and slightly healthier.  If you’re feeling experimental and/or healthy and/or motivated, then you could try adding tomato and chicken (I was feeling none of these things.  I was just feeling hungry).

What you need:

• 100g pasta
• ½ red onion
• 1 clove of garlic
• 4 tbsp crème fraiche
• 4 tbsp tomato paste
• Grated parmesan
• As many dried chilli flakes as you can tolerate…

What to do:

Bring a pan of water to a boil, and add 100g of pasta. Next, finely chop the red onion, and fry it with a drizzle of olive oil in a different pan until it softens.

Chop or crush the garlic, then add that to the onion, along with the crème fraiche, tomato paste, and chilli flakes. I also added basil and oregano because they were looking left out at the back of my cupboard.

When the pasta is cooked, add a little splash of the water to the sauce to loosen it slightly. After that, drain the pasta, then add it to the other pan. Coat the pasta in the sauce, then spoon it onto a plate and sprinkle with the parmesan.

Beetroot Curry

The beetroot turns this curry into the most fantabulous pink colour. It tastes pretty fabulous, too! I roasted the beets myself because my flatmate and I had loads as part of an overly elaborate reference to the Office… but if you don’t have the time or the oven, then you can buy pre-cooked and vacuum-packed beetroot in the pre-prepared veg section of Sainsbury’s or Aldi.

This recipe serves two, so you can either save some for tomorrow or make a flatmate very happy.

What you need:

• Either a packed of cooked beetroot or approximately 250g of beets.
• 1 onion
• 1 can of chickpeas
• 1 can of coconut milk
• ½ jar korma curry paste
• Fresh coriander
• Rice or naan bread

What to do:

If you’re roasting the beetroot yourself, preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Peel the beets and chop them into chunks (bear in mind that your fingertips will probably be tinged pink for a few hours. Drizzle them with oil, and roast for about half an hour.

I also sprinkled them with cumin and turmeric because I saw them in my flatmate’s cupboard and got excited.

Chop the onion, and fry it in a little oil until it just starts to soften. Drain the chickpeas, and add them and the beetroot to the pan. I also added crushed garlic and chilli flakes, but these definitely aren’t compulsory if you don’t have any.

Mix the coconut milk, then pour into the pan. Stir in the curry paste. Simmer on a low paste for about ten to fifteen minutes (or for as long as you can be bothered…)

Serve with coriander and either rice or naan bread!

Strawberry Cake

Few of us Cambridge students have the time, energy, cupboard space – or even the ovens – baking requires.  But this cake is very student-friendly – it doesn’t require any special equipment and needs just a few ingredients that you’ll only ever use a spoon of before they’re banished to the back of your cupboard for the rest of term.

What you need:

• 1 bag of vanilla cake mix
• 2 eggs
• 8 tbsp milk
• Pink food colouring
• A punnet of strawberries
• Half a bar of white chocolate
• Cake sprinkles

What to do:

To begin, line a deep roasting tin with baking paper, and preheat the oven to 180.

Make up the cake mix according to what it says on the back – the one I used needed eggs and milk. I also stirred a few spoon fulls of crème fraiche in because I had some left over from making the pasta and it felt like a good idea.

Add the pink food colouring! So that you don’t accidentally add too much and the cake ends up colour-coordinating with my burgundy college scarf, only add a little splash of food colouring at a time.

Pour the cake mix into the tin. Slice the strawberries in half, and arrange them on top of the cake.

Bake the cake for about thirty minutes, until it starts coming away from the sides of the tin or a knife comes out clean.

Wait for the cake to cool down. Melt the chocolate, and drizzle it over the top in a vaguely artistic way.  Add the sprinkles, et voila!

So, there you are! I hope you feel inspired to do some Pink Week themed cooking and remember to check out The Tab’s guide to Pink Week events.

Pink Week logo via Instagram. All other images are the author’s own.

Related articles recommended by this writer

• Trip to the Gyp: Veganuary Edition
• Trip to the Gyp: One-Tray-Meal Edition
• Trip to the Gyp: the ‘I-can’t-cook’ Edition