To celebrate our group exhibition Citizens of Memory, The Perimeter commissioned artist Olivia Sterling and food writer Sophie Godwin (@sophonaplate) to produce a new work that addresses hedonism and self-denial in contemporary discourse on diet and health, the culinary facets of 'British' identity, and that old schoolyard pleasure – the food fight. Guilty Pleasure (2021) consists of an impossible recipe and accompanying illustrations by Sterling.
Guilty Pleasure
Serves: 1 generously
Please do not feel the urge to share, split or give away. Smack your child out the way, lock yourself in the bathroom - give yourself this one treat!
Time taken: As long as one needs
This may be referring to the time taken to accept oneself, to rid oneself of hateful thoughts. Either way, take the time to get into this mindset: my sense of physical self has been constructed by white supremacy and I am no longer going to define my worth by my physicality; I am going to eat what I want'
Ingredients
Several best of British strawberries*
*try to ignore the nationalist undertones of these. Britain of colour was made from blood and bone - blood as red as our strawberries
An amusing large slice of Angel cake*
So innocent, you needn’t worry about the calories
A handful of pink and green stripped meringue kisses*
Pastels, pale is pleasing to the eye - isn’t it
3 scoops of ice cream
More pastels, innocent, pure - superior
As much as you fancy strawberry sauce
2 pink panther wafers
A healthy squirt of cold whipped cream
A small amount of highest-quality pistachios
A plump cherry
Whole jar? It doesn’t matter at this point
Method
Fan the strawberries, break the Angel cake and smash the meringues into delightful pieces. Find the tallest sundae glass you can.
Layer the strawberries, cake and meringue into the glass along with intermittent scoops of the ice cream and strawberry sauce. Whenever you fancy prod in a pink panther wafer.
Once full to the brim, squirt over the whipped cream for respectable lightness.
Gild the lily by nicely chopping and scattering over the pistachios. Serve topped with the cherry and a healthy sprinkle of defiance. Eat with an absurdly long spoon; politely of course.
