FROMAGE A TROIS

Label for gift cheese.

The beginning.

Stage two.

Stage three.

BLESSED BE THE CHEESEMAKERS

The process is ridiculously simple. First line a colander with a clean tea towel. Forget about cheesecloth. Chances are that you'd have to buy and in my experience it does not lend itself to repeated use. Go with the tea towel. You will feel green and virtuous.

Next you take half a gallon of milk, pour it into a pan that will accommodate at least four time amount. I used a Le Creuset Dutch oven, but there are those who insist on aluminum pots. The choice is yours. heat the milk to to 185F, stirring constantly to prevent burning. I recommend using a whisk for stirring. When the milk reaches 185F will be bubbling merrily and threatening to run over. Be not afraid. Gradually stir in one fourth of a cup of vinegar and continue to stir without pause for twenty minutes. The milk will separate into curd and whey, as if Miss Muffet prefers. The curds will be tiny and you might experience a moment of doubt as in,

"This is going to be cheese?"

Courage. It will be cheese and it will be good. Just pour it into the colander and let it rest for fifteen minutes. You might want to save the whey which is packed with good nutrients and it is most useful in bread making, soups, what have you. At the end of fifteen minutes, tie the ends of the tea towel and hang it above a sink or deep bowl. allow the cheese to drain for seven hours. Unwrap and salt it with kosher salt, if you wish. You might want to add fresh or dried herbs to it. You may also marinate in in olive oil to which you have added garlic and herbs. It is perfectly delicious plain.

This makes a dandy contribution to potluck dinners, picnics, tailgate feasts. In this case you might want to make a pretty label for it. I am calling mine Fromage a Trois and I am so pleased with it I intend to get me some goats milk and make some chevre.

If you are counting pennies, as most of us must these days, keep in mind that half a gallon of milk yields four ounces of queso fresco at half what the commercial products costs at the local grocery store.

VILLAINS AND VILLANELLES

Tarahumara Sunflower from Territorial seeds is my choice for beauty and as a seed source for the birds.

The Turtle Dove by Anglo-French pre-Raphaelite Sophie Anderson (1823-1903)

Doves by Audubon

Linguistic evolution fascinates me. How did we come to equate villanus, farmworker, with wickedness? Is a rustic necessarily a criminal? Recent history teaches us that bankers and lawyers are often more villainous than farm workers, but will the English language endow both nouns with a negative meaning? The subject is on my mind because I ought to be working on a chapter of my novel, Whip of Fire, the second of the Luna Mellul series. That chapter deals with a man known as El Queso Fresco and his plot to kidnap Luna, the first ever a Bat Anussim detective--the B'nei Anoussim are descendants of forcibly baptized Iberian Jews . Luna lives in the village of Heavenly Hollow, West Virginia and she manages to get entangled with very wicked folks indeed.

This being one of these soft as silk mornings when sunlight brings with the song of mourning doves, aka rain doves, I find it easier to think of poetry. The villanelle La Tourterelle Envollee by Jean Passerat (1534-1602), for example,

"Ie perdu ma Tourterelle

Est-ce point celle que ioie?

Ie veus aller apres elle."

That, in turn, brings to mind Antonia's aria from Jacques Offenbach's Les Contes d"Hoffman, Elle a Fui la Tourterelle. I seem to recall hearing Kiri The Kanawa sing it years ago during a Public Broadcasting Systems presentation of Die Fledermaus. Later, during a BBC episode of All Things Bright and Beautiful, I heard a drunken farm workersand a ditty about "my queen, my turtledove." What of mourning doves?

The Mexican classic Cucurrucucu Paloma notwithstanding, Zenaida macroura, the doves that lavish my mornings with sweet sound, lead vastly unsung lives for all that theirs is an epic struggle for survival. Rat snakes gobble up their eggs, cats decimate them and as if that were not enough, hunters kill 70 million of them annually "for sport and for the meat." In my opinion, there can only be sport in shooting living creatures when the creatures can shoot back. As for the amount of meat provided by a mourning dove I suspect that it considerably less than the poundage available at the local supermarket.

Despite the annual carnage visited upon them by so-called sportsmen, mourning doves are not yet and endangered species. That is not the case of the Turtle Dove. According to the State of Europe's Common Birds 2007 report, Turtle Dove population has shrunk by 62% in recent times. Hunting during migration is one of the factors in this dramatic change. The use of weed killers is another. Turtle Doves feed on plants from the Fumariacea family which short sighted farming practices will probably succeed in eliminating.

The huge number of blogs at

www.blotanical.com

dealing with conservation and environmental issues demonstrates that there is a growing grassroots, no pun intended, movement towards the greening of the planet and wildlife preservation. Given that the 62% mortality rate for adult mourning doves seems to be attributed mostly to hunting, there does not seem to be a great one can do protect them at present. One can keep one's cats indoors whenever possible--keeping one's hunter indoors would be equally helpful. One can plant conifers and sow amaranth, millet, corn, millet and safflower to provide the seeds that make up almost 100% of the mourning doves' diet. Americans interested in helping protect yhese and other besieged urban birds can find excellent suggestions, grants, and participatory projects at the Cornell University Ornithology Lab.

www.birds.cornell.edu

Let there be more villanelles in praise of birds and fewer villains hell bent on killing them. Let there be fewer villains altogether, except for El Queso Fresco, whose presence is part of The Whip of Fire and whose dastardly deeds shall not go unpunished. Next, we make cheese at Rain Dove House.

WHAT WOULD ANNE FRANK THINK?

Rose The Fairy, organically grown.

Calendulas and pansies are edible.

Cousin David giant slayer, guards the goods against Bambi & Co.

Gooseberries are a controlled substance in West Virginia. They might carry a fungus fatal to white pine.

"The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be. " Anne Frank

WHAT WOULD ANNE FRANK THINK?

The bad news is that free speech continues to be abused by haters such as president Obama's former pastor Jeremiah Wright, who claims that "them Jews" are blocking his access to the White House. This, following the fatal shooting of Holocaust Museum security guard Stephen T. Johns, by Neo Nazi James von Brunn, points to the supreme irony of an African American pastor and a Neo Nazi being on the same page when it comes to "them Jews." I wonder what Anne Frank, whose 80th. birthday the Holocaust Museum was about to commemorate on the day of the shooting, would have thought of this. What would she have thought of the reelection of Iranian Ahmadinejad, another Holocaust denying Jew hater? Would she continue to think, in face of apparently deathless bigotry, that "people are really good at heart"? Most probably. In the battle between light and darkness, light always prevails. Pathetic, frightened, narrow spirited people such von Brunn, Wright and Ahmadinejad end up as minor historical bleeps.The greatness of heart of Stephen T. Johns, and Anne Frank live on. This is the good news.

The good news in the garden is that the passion fruit vine is up and that the gooseberries are ripening. Calendulas raised from seeded have popped. The tomatoes have been potted, finally. The herbs--dill, basil, coriander--seem to be thriving although the snail population is growing by leaps and bounds and there are colonies of potato bugs in several of the container plantings. Beets, pumpkin and zucchini have sprouted and the snow peas are lush and green.

Amid positive horticultural happenings there is cause for trepidation. Bambi has made a day time appearance near the vegetable garden. It stood there eyeing its salad bar fearless brazenly. I take this to mean that the Bambi family--Mama, Papa Bambi and two bambini--has declared jihad on "them veggies." As a response, I have placed a statue of a remote relative of mine, David, the giant slayer, amid the greenery. This is meant as warning that we of the tribe of Judah love peace, but we also love our veggies. Whether David will deter depredation depends on how badly he wants to fight. He might have to take out her nuclear reactor. I hope it does not come to that. I would rather reach some sort of compromise. Hilary Clinton and Ban Ki Moon might want to help. The Dalai Lama might be persuaded to mediate. I am willing to let Bambi have some of the veggies. She cannot under any circumstances eat all of them as she did last year. I am not discussing expansion of settlements with her and that is that. I will let you know how this shakes out.

While the UN debates Bambi's declaration of war, I will be unpacking rose shipments from Nor'East Miniature Roses, Heirloom Roses and Rogue River Roses. I intend to plant them with clematis from Bluestone Perennials. In order to that I must reclaim a border that has been taken over by the fatal tree of heaven and other invasive entities. This is an enormous job, not easily accomplished in hot, humid weather when all one wishes to do is to lie languidly in a hammock with Colette's essays in hand and a tall glass of icy lemonade nearby.

NOTE: DOES ANYONE KNOW OF A SOURCE FOR SOUVENIR D'ANNE FRANK ROSES IN THE US? I WOULD LIKE TO DONATE ONE TO A PUBLIC GARDEN IN HONOR OF STEPHEN T. JOHNS.

GROSS GREEN GREED

Path at Georges Sand's garden, Nohant.

The dream--Georges Sand's garden at Nohant, painted by Delacroix.

The reality--a modest path bordered by sweet rocket and a a volunteer redbud.

A Worth creation

In my next life I will embrace minimalism. I will wear starkly tailored black clothes and live in a Richard Neutrahhouse decorated with no more than a couple of Noguchi pieces. I will become a vegan and drink nothing but Pernod. I will read Derrida and listen to Phillip Glass. I will make a Japanese garden with only three plants. If you believe that, I have a bridge I would like to sell you.

These are the facts--I believe that if you don't have some excess in your life, you are on your way to becoming one of those one-dimensional stick people little kids draw. If I could choose two clothes designers, I would choose Vionnet and Worth. I like plush, lush, sumptuous stuff. I like silk velvet, satin, soft Kashmiri shawls, handmade Valenciennes lace. I like colors--cinnabar, eau de nil, heliotrope, indigo, lapis lazuli, rose madder, saffron yellow. Minimalism, deconstructionism, pretty much any kind of ism just isn't my thing. There is no danger that I will become the owner of a Japanese garden. I don't have the temperament for Zen. Mine is a very Victorian sensibility. I like Queen Anne houses and Cotswold cottages. I love Grand Marnier and I detest Pernod. Though I mean to reform any day soon, I am, at present, an unreconstructed meat eater. I love Eastlake chairs and camel back sofas, reproductions of Paul Duprees sugary botanical paintings, blue and white Sttafordshire, flowery Limoges, embroidered linens and frilly furbelows. I could almost say, as Flaubert did, that "Madame Bovary, c'est moi." Minus Charles, Rodolphe, Leon and suicide, bien sur.

I do not have the temperament for Zen. I adore Dickens in all his overblown verbosity, I love Tchaikovy's folksy musical gingerbread and I would not trade Beethoven's Appassionata for a million Glass concerti.

Now, don't go thinking that I go around swathed in silks and velvets. I should be so lucky. I wear denim all too often. I live in a log house and my love of Victorian trappings is kept severely in check by budgetary constraints. But for better or for worse, plants are my downfall. I burn with a lust that has no bounds for roses and roses and roses and peonies and irises and ferns and poppies. I lust for pawpaw and yuzu and meddlars, bananas and fig trees. Then I lust some more. As we speak, I wait with great impatience for the arrival of approximately two dozens roses, twenty peonies, a dozen ferns, a white ornamental quince, a clump of Hakonechloa, half a dozen German irises and three Fialla lilacs. As I wait, I work on a wish list that grows dangerously long--the old roses roses Ghislaine de Feligonde, Guirlande d'Amour, Queen of the Bourbons, Ispahan, Kazanlik, Omar Khayyam, Deuil de Paul Fontaine, Charles de Mills, Rose de Reshts, Perles des Panachees, Tour de Malakoff, Robin Hood, and the newer Livin' Easy. Finding room for this many plants could be a problem unless I tear up the lawn. I have some space I am honor bound to leave untouched. The turtles and birds that live in my neighborhood need it more than I do. The lawn is another story. I am very tempted to do away with it. However, it is no good to imagine that it can be replaced by roses and perennials. I would have to go with native plan, deer resistant plants that require no watering. Bother. In my next life I to be George Sand. Better yet, I want to be Queen Victoria.

DAILY MINUTIAE

Scene of the crime.

Corpus delicious

Araucana blue egg shells help the herbs grow. Lemon and lavendar gelato, anyone?

"If you are irritated by every rub, how will you be polished?"

— Mawlana Jalal-al-Din Rumi

The plan was to clean a couple of flowerbeds, plant half a dozen clematis and move the tomato seedlings to the garden. I almost managed it. I cleaned one flower bed, removing honeysuckle, bindweed, Virginia creeper and an unknown monster that has glossy heart shaped leaves and that pousse comme rien. Mind you, I love the scent of honeysuckle, I love the inverted umbrella shape of bindweed flowers, I love the elegantly serrated leaves of Virginia creeper and I admire the perfect elegance of the heart-shaped thingie. I would allow them to grow rampant were it not for their deplorable tendency to strangle the roses and perennials. So, I go on periodic eradication binges, uncovering rockery and liberating irises and peonies. Today, before I could do much damage to the pesky creepers, sirens went off, policemen parked their cars across the intersection at the end of our block. Next, a policeman went from door to door telling residents to stay indoors. That was pretty alarming, considering that once the university louts are gone for the summer, nothing much disturbs the peace of my village. It was more alarming to hear that there been been a chlorine leak in the water plant less than a block away from my house. That was the end of gardening for the day.

Retreating into the house was no great hardship. At a humid 80F plus, the weather was more conducive to inertia than to great battles with giant creepers. It helped that lately, the Infanta had been trying her hand, quite successfully, I might add, at making ice cream. Homemade ice cream helps calm the nerves, soothes irritation and helps clear the mind. A bowl of the Infanta's ice cream is pure magic. Her first effort, pictured above, was delicious, but since she had run out of ice while making it, the texture was slightly grainy. Her next attempt, fresh strawberries flavored with Fiori di Sicilia was perfectly scrumptious. For the moment, she is using an electric ice cream machine I picked up at a thrift shop for 25 cents or so. If I know her, eventually she will dust off our old hand cranked White Mountain ice cream maker and make a gelato with herbs--perhaps lemon and lavender. For the record, it cost about $15 to produce the first half gallon of ice cream. It is a good thing we did not have to shell out $ 500 for the White Mountain model a fancy mail order catalog was offering a few months ago.

FAREWELL TO NOR'EAST MINIATURE ROSES RETAIL

Even as it fades, Michel Cholet miniature rose displays a lovely array of colours.

Miniature rose Stardust has both the perfume and the elegant shape of Heirloom Roses.

I am probably the only person left in my village who still ends her wishful sentences with a "G'd willing and the creek don't rise." first of all, the creek no longer is what it used to be on colonial days when it powered seventeen mills. Building the village meant altering its course so that it vanished from some places while going underground in others. Luckily, it continues to run behind the houses on my block and the sound of its waterfall persists as one of the most pleasant remnants of its former glory.

For all its gentle nature, the creek does rise on occasion, as it has been doing after a particularly heavy, three-day long rainfall. If I am not shopping for a new canoe just yet--my friend Bob bought the older one and I hope he does not mind that it tends to veer to left--it is that there has never been a flood in my neighbourhood. It does feel good to be on high ground just the same as changes have been known to take one by surprise. Such a change has taken place at Nor'East Miniature Roses, a nursery with which I have done business for almost thirty years. During that time, I tried its Judy Fischer, Jean Kennely, Rise'n'shine, Cupcake, Starina, and Beauty Secret roses, finally settling on the mini climber Jeanne LaJoie as the most suited for my garden. Only last year I ordered red cascade minis for container gardens and lovely it was with peach coloured geraniums for company. This year, I added Michael Cholet and Stardust to my collection. Alas, after June 30th. Nor'East Roses will discontinue its retail business. At the moment, it is selling its roses for the ridiculously low price of $ 3. 75 plus shipping. Though at such low cost I can order two of the the Yellow Lady Banks climbers I have coveted for years but dared try, given they are most probably too tender for Zone 6. I will plant them by the sunny wall against which the tender Fortuniana has thrived. I will surround them with Fiala lilacs, Grant Mitsch daffodils, Duchesse de Nemours peonies and Hidcote lavender. How can they fail to flourish? I will miss Nor'East Roses all the same.

MUSTARD CHICKEN WITH A FRENCH ACCENT

Baked chicken breasts in a creamy sauce.

The moon waxes gibbous, the first fireflies greet the twilight with a luminous ballet on a stage set with clouds of white roses. Ha Motzie, the half pure Siamese cat plays in the shadows, hoping to fly as high as the fireflies, certain that if she fails, she will be chasing voles by the light of the moon. The evening is so still one can hear the creek sing its way to the river. In the garden, gooseberries ripen, peas grow fat and the first salad greens are ready for harvesting. In world filled with troubling news, evenings such as these are cause for celebration and in

my corner of the woods, celebrations involve cook and sharing food.

Long ago, in the country where I grew up, celebratory meals centered on succulent free range chicken that had been allowed to soak in the flavors of shallots, garlic, black pepper and cilantro. On holidays, good hostess would instruct their cooks to soak whole capons in a molho made from lager and aromatics. Thus anointed, they birds would be sent to the baker, who seemed to welcome a change from his daily preparation of countless baguettes.

Free range chickens, personal chefs and obliging bakers are as accessible to me as the fireflies are to earthbound Ha Motzie. Nevertheless, the baked chicken I prepare on firefly evenings is quite tasty. What I do is tweak a recipe for Poulet a la Moutarde by rubbing two skinless skinless chicken breasts with salt, pepper and herbes de Provence prior to slathering them with Dijon-style mustard. Then I place the chicken breasts in an ovenproof dish, carefully add cup of heavy cream--it is important not to wash away the mustard--and half a cup of white wine. I bake the chicken for forty minutes at 350F. C'est tout, except for a salad, roasted new potatoes and freshly baked rice rolls, of which more anon.