By mid-August, the light still hangs around after dinner, but there is a first hint that summer is beginning to loosen its grip. This is the moment for food that tastes of the grill, music that gets better as the room darkens, a film with enough energy to carry the evening and a book slim enough to disappear into before the season changes.
Eat.
Meera Sodha's spicy sweetcorn
Sweetcorn belongs to these last weeks of summer, especially when it is cooked until the kernels catch a little colour. Meera Sodha's version is rubbed with Kashmiri chilli, cumin, coriander and lemon, turning something simple into exactly the sort of smoky, bright plate that works beside a cup of chai as the evening cools.
Listen.
Arooj Aftab - Night Reign
Arooj Aftab makes music for the hour when daylight has almost gone but you are not ready to go inside. Night Reign moves between Urdu poetry, jazz, ambient space and South Asian classical influence with extraordinary restraint. Put it on after dusk, leave the windows open a little longer and let the record take its time.
Watch.
Polite Society
Nida Manzoor's London-set comedy takes sisterhood, family expectations and a very elaborate wedding plan, then throws martial arts into the mix. It is unmistakably British and Pakistani at the same time, with the confidence to be both affectionate and completely ridiculous. A good choice when the evening still feels too lively for anything solemn.
Read.
Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
Set around a squash court and a British Gujarati family learning how to live with grief, Chetna Maroo's Western Lane is spare, precise and quietly absorbing. It has the feel of late summer itself: movement on the surface, something more complicated underneath. At under 200 pages, it is the sort of novel you can begin after lunch and still be thinking about at sunset.
Keep the evening simple: corn while it is still in season, one record all the way through, a film with some life in it and a book before the light finally goes.
