How Blue Is My Valley Read online

  November roses will always remind me of my 18th birthday and the special card my mother bought me, with roses on it and Omar Khayyam’s words inside:-

  ‘Look to the Rose that blows about us – ‘Lo,

  Laughing,’ she says ‘into the world I blow:

  At once the silken tassel of my Purse

  Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.’

  I never planted roses when I was younger, because their beauty was so short-lived and the bushes didn’t earn their keep in my garden. I have changed my mind. Beauty, even if only for a day, is still treasure and I have learnt to accept the thorns and the time to scatter petals. I have also grown to love sentimental old Fitzgerald’s version of Khayyam:-

  ‘And when Thyself with shining Foot shall pass

  Among the Guests Star-scattered on the Grass,

  And in thy joyous Errand reach the Spot

  Where I made one – turn down an empty Glass!’

  Tamam shud

  It is completed.

  4

  Goat Cheese with a Sting

  I investigate some mushrooms in our lawn so that I can check them out in my pocket guide, knocking one over to study it better; pure white caps with white gills and neat edges. I idly browse through the guide while I eat my toast and marmalade... that looks similar but it does not sound good... ‘like many all white mushrooms, poisonous, in fact deadly... wash hands carefully after even touching it’.

  I inspect my hands, the left one a little sticky with marmalade. Merde! Did I turn over the lethal weapon with my left hand (very bad) or right (not so bad, I haven’t touched my toast with that one and I don’t think I’ve licked the handle of my coffee cup)?

  I wash my hands with all the enthusiasm of Lady Macbeth after a bad night and already I can feel my stomach clenching. John will come home to find me a twisted corpse clawing at the table legs (although if I’m a corpse I’ll probably have stopped clawing by that stage). How is he going to get home if I can’t meet him at the station? To take my mind off my impending demise, I decide to work on the goat cheese project.

  In addition to its air, pottery and IQ level, Dieulefit has its famous goat cheese, le Picodon, so good it is awarded the status of appellation controlée. My knowledge of goats is limited but the emotional scars are deep. It started well, in the early days of my move to Wales when one of my colleagues who moonlighted (moonlit?) as a farmer, or was it the other way around? gave me a regular supply of fresh goat’s milk for a few months. My (other) Welsh friends were horrified at me drinking goat milk – there was obviously no telling what we English people would try when we moved to Wales and played at rural life – but I quite enjoyed the earthiness of it and the words ‘direct from the farm’ still hold magic for me.

  I also ate goat (I think) but the newly ex-graduate friend who revealed what the roast had been, was the sort who also revealed that you’d just eaten hash cake, and I didn’t find anything weird, different or exciting on either occasion; the former tasted like pork and the latter like girl guides’ fairy buns. However, you do have to bear in mind that I once disgraced myself at a dinner party by commenting, as I turned over a metal thingy with my fork, that I’d got shot in my chicken (it was the first time I’d eaten pheasant and how was I to know that no-one shot chickens?) so I confess to a certain naiveté in my gastronomic education.

  Next encounters with a goat were also very positive. An English friend busy pursuing self-sufficiency à la John Seymour, as we did in Wales in the seventies, was babysitting her neighbour’s goats and I milked one with moderate success and all kinds of virtuous feelings.

  (This was the same friend who needed someone to take in a beehive, for a month. It had to be someone who lived far enough away that the bees wouldn’t get confused and waggledance their way back to where their hive was supposed to be. It also had to be someone very gullible as it was May. I spent a month too scared to go to the bottom of my own garden in case they swarmed. How do you know if a beehive’s overcrowding anyway? And preferably before the buggers produce a new queen and swarm).

  Having all these ill-conceived notions of how sweet goats were and completely ignoring a wealth of western literature in which a goat represents the devil, (if you look at those yellow eyes and square pupils the word ‘sweet’ is not the first which pops into any sane woman’s head), I volunteered to get a kid for a friend who must have been similarly deluded.

  ‘While you’re getting one anyway, can you get me one too?’ someone else asked, so I did. I took the estate car that had once been my father’s well-polished pride and joy, headed off down the usual Carmarthenshire tracks where the cars trim the hedgerows, did the deal and heaved two squealing, jumping kids into the boot. I tethered them carefully in the garden, thought how sweet they looked and the next time I looked through the window there was only one – and a well-chewed rope. I phoned the friend whose goat had done a bunk and village rumour said it was heading down the hill towards her place. For all I know she’s still tearing around Pontyberem, eating plenty of fibre.

  This left me with the less-evil one. How did I know which was which? I would have thought it obvious; by a wonderful coincidence, the friend I liked the better was the one whose goat I could still see. Leaving Goatless Friend to find herself a goat, I took great care of the Lesser Evil for the week I was minding her while Better Friend was on holiday.

  I discovered that a goat eats everything except the long grass you were hoping it would trim for you; it eats your favourite shrubs, fabric of any kind – especially newly washed – and bricks – at least that’s the only way I can account for the disappearing corner on the end of the pigsty.

  I had tethered Lesser Evil beside the pigsty so she could shelter from the rain. Surprisingly, goatcoats have no weatherproofing, which is probably what makes kid leather so soft (but you don’t want to think about goatskin, do you). I was singing and washing dishes, looking out of the window at the happy little goat, which had jumped onto the pigsty roof. Very cute.

  I carried on singing and washing dishes, and glanced out of the window to see a goat in the last stages of death by hanging. Not so cute. She had either fallen or jumped (or even been pushed – the jury’s out) and caught the rope around the pigsty gable, suspending herself by the neck as is the wont of very strange rock stars in search of thrills.

  I rushed down the garden path and lifted her heels to relax the noose and let her breathe. As she was still alive and I was alone, and I couldn’t hold her and reach the gable, there was only one thing for it – I had to drop her again, with a fairly sickening lurch and a very unpleasant glare from two narrowed yellow eyes. From there on it was straightforward; I had to haul the goat up by the neck to give me enough slack to throw the rope back over the gable.

  Lesser Evil was duly lowered, while I kept tight hold of the rope – not even a near-death experience will stop a goat doing a runner, in fact I wouldn’t guarantee that it wasn’t a set-up – and I tethered her firmly well away from the pigsty or any shelter (bugger the lack of weatherproofing – it was probably a country fiction anyway). She reached Better Friend safely and apparently led a long, placid life – I was just lucky to know her in her salad days.

  Despite all of this hard-earned goat expertise, I only discovered goat cheese on holiday in the south of France, where the little Banons from the Vaucluse became a favourite on the cheese-board. They look appealing, these small rounds wrapped in chestnut leaves to keep them moist, or in the many variations where an outer coating of red peppers or spices adds colour and scent to the bland and creamy cheese. They complement so many other tastes; olives, peppers, ham... and they melt in cooking sauces, on pizzas, on pasta.

  Goat cheese is a cook’s treasure and, having discovered it, I wanted to find some in Wales when we went back home. It shouldn’t have been difficult as there are, as I knew, goats in Wales. There is indeed wonderful goat cheese in Wales but finding it is as difficult as finding local apples.

  Even a
t the stall in Carmarthen market that sells a Welsh type of cheddar, with names like St Illtyds, and options of garlic and mustard in the variants, even there the goat’s cheese sold was from Somerset. This is a national disgrace and I will never understand why British supermarkets and shops are so reluctant to stock local produce, unless the balance between quality and price has tipped the wrong way in all retailers. In Wales, it almost seems part of the cultural lack of confidence which says ‘If it’s from round here, then it can’t be any good.’

  What food is good in Wales? You only have to listen for two minutes to the Italian chef who made Abergavenny’s ‘The Walnut Tree’ an attraction to foodies across Britain, to know the answer. Have you tried sewin straight from the River Cothi, a fisherman’s dream of a river that rushes between the good green pastures (all that rain is good for something)? Have you eaten new Pembrokeshire potatoes? Beetroot and rhubarb from a neighbour? Beef from Welsh Black cattle, ordered in advance and direct from the farmer, who is also your milkman and delivers his dairy produce to your door? And Welsh lamb, surely the best in the world?

  That’s just a few of the mainstream items but in Wales you can easily have the space, and you have the climate, to grow your own – there is nothing like mangetout peas, broccoli and lettuce fresh from your own garden. There are also the wild places, beaches where you can find lavabread (seaweed to you), cliffs where samphire grows, woods full of wild strawberries, hedgerows covered in blackberries and fields full of autumn mushrooms.

  If we were French, we would be proud of all of this; we would want to eat it and talk about it – and buy it in our shops. ‘He’s a farmer’ wouldn’t mean ‘he’s some lower class person of diminished brain’.

  The farmers, vintners and producers here in France all have their own associations, specialist apprenticeships and a range of agricultural courses. They also express themselves powerfully, usually with several thousand tractors all blocking key motorway arteries or by violent assault against foreign competition; gain enormous subsidies and promote local produce in ways which range from the obvious (through local shops, factory tours and a website) to the downright bizarre (the village boasting the biggest pile of chestnuts in the world).

  Our farming specialism here in Dieulefit is goat’s cheese so we have an annual fête under the banner ‘le Picodon chez lui.’ The Picodon is yet another small round goat’s cheese but to gain a.o.c. status as made in the Dieulefitois way, it must be refined and regularly washed in water for a month. People will try to tell you that the Picodon came from the Ardèche (where they allegedly wash them in white wine or eau-de-vie) or from the Vercors but this is of course calumny and you must not believe such terrible lies. The Picodon originated in Dieulefit, ‘chez lui’ (its home) as the defiant note reads on the banner. Proof? Its oldest mention was dated 1361 at Dieulefit and its name comes from the local dialect ‘pico’ meaning ‘slightly piquant’.

  From the moment I saw Cavet’s Picodon creamery through my bedroom window, I conceived the goat’s cheese project and grew more fired with missionary zeal as I realised the sad lack of books in English about goats’ cheese. My Internet research revealed that of the two books I could find, the more interesting was written by an order of American nuns and is now out of print. The time is obviously as ripe as the cheese for the Jean Gill Book of 50 things to do with a Picodon.

  I start my research with the goats and even they are different here, apparently living in well-disciplined communes. When we were walking the Pyreneans up in the woods, we knew from the bells that the goat herd was on the move and we reached the lane to see two black and white border collies shepherding the lop-eared bleating source of the noise.

  We bonjoured our local goatherd, who probably has a degree in capriculture from Valence University and who sports a beard longer than his lead goat’s. (I have never understood why short pointy beards are called goatees – you only have to look at a goat’s wispy face decoration to see that it’s more like that of a maharishi vowed to hair and saintliness). The herd walks daily and if we are in the garden or walking back from the village, thirty tiny clappers echo across the hills from the woods above us.

  My project research continued with the purchase of five blue Picodons at Dieulefit’s fête. This was when I discovered that the different coloured cheeses lined up at the stall were the same cheese, or to be more exact, cheeses made in the same way, but aged for different lengths of time.

  Ageing makes the cheese stronger (lucky cheese) and the blue crusted Picodons do have that mouldy tang you would associate with a mild blue cheese like a dolcellatte, while being nowhere near as salty as a roquefort. (I know these are not the words an expert would use but if ordinary people don’t talk about it, even using all the wrong words, how are we going to become better eaters? Or buyers?

  The French have the best word for it; they talk about ‘amateurs de ....’, for instance ‘amateurs de fromage’ meaning what we would call ‘experts’ – the French word suggests the enthusiasm of non-professionals and I will drink my Côtes du Rhône to that).

  Having discovered middle-aged Picodon and started an ongoing conversation with the producer and market stall-holder, I have continued my education on Fridays at Dieulefit’s market. This led to me buying a vieux Picodon, which I presented to John at lunchtime with a flourish, telling him that this would have a really strong taste.

  I raised the cheese knife and hit solid wood – no, I hadn’t missed and hit the cheese board, it was the cheese from which the knife rebounded, blunted.

  ‘Perhaps we won’t take a slice off this one,’ I suggested, gathering the few shavings that had dropped off the aged Picodon, more in fright at the sight of the knife descending than because they’d actually been cut, and I sprinkled them over my bread.

  It was a very definite strongly cheesy taste; ‘pico’ could indeed be the word if I were a fourteenth century Dieulefitoise. It was not however an elegant way of serving cheese and I couldn’t believe I was going about this the right way.

  The shavings gave me the idea by reminding me of parmesan (the real thing, that smells of sick and looks like old soap) and so I tried grating it onto savoury pancakes and onto pasta, and voila! it seemed I had some more recipes for my book. I was happily exploring how many things I could do with an old Picodon when I noticed that my face flannel smelt of cheese, my pillows smelt of cheese and unwashed socks smelt less cheesy than anything else in the house. Either I was losing my nose or I’d overdone the Picodon so I left it alone for a few days ... and discovered olives.

  Not just olives of course but how many different varieties there are and what they all taste like. There is an olive stand in Dieulefit market where queues of people stand with their cheque-books out, ready to buy by the carrier-bag; this is the stall you should go to. King of the French table olives is the a.o.c. Nyons tanche, bruised black and mellow, producing the appellation controlée olive oil which is a very expensive treat (and an excuse for another mad village fête after olive-picking in December).

  Our current favourite is a green olive in garlic, mild, garlicky and moreish, but we have adventured beyond these. Savouring ‘olives in peppers’ at lunchtime, I was unable to tell John that they were in fact in chili peppers, until I had downed two glasses of water straight off.

  You know that moment when you’re young and innocent and you chew on a cool green thingy after eating something a bit too spicy, and someone says, ‘Sorry, perhaps I should have told you that the green things are chilies?’ It was one of those moments.

  We subsequently invented a spectacular French version of chili con carne with the heat provided entirely by twelve olives. Then there were the lemon olives - too lemony. They worked very well in home made foccacia. Last to date have been the black olives in garlic – they were too ... black.

  My olive education is in its early stages but two hundred metres to the left (the Picodon Cavet being two hundred metres to the right) is an olive oil producer so I am hopeful that I will b
ecome an ‘amateur’ taught by a member of the appropriate ‘confrérie’ or ‘guild’.

  I only wish I could add a garlic expert to my local contacts; they wear some amazing hats in the newspaper photo of the ‘confrérie d’ail’. Now that would be a certificate for an ambitious woman like me to aim for in the future – I have after all planted two dozen cloves amongst the rosebeds as a natural insecticide.

  While waiting to die of mushroom poisoning, I pot some dried tomatoes, using Carluccio’s trick of soaking them first in vinegar to water, 1:4, adding a peeled clove of garlic and then covering them in olive oil. It’s the potting that does it – my new obsession gets the better of me and out come the three old Picodons I have been saving for an experiment which the market seller has told me will not work.

  In one of the books I sneak a look at each time we call at the newsagent’s, I read the old Provençal suggestion that old Picodons could be turned into delicacies for the cheese board by stacking them in olive oil, separated by a sprig of fresh savoury and with a peeled garlic clove added. My market expert said that the olive oil won’t penetrate the hard outer crusts (not to mention the hard inner crust) but if nothing else I will get interestingly-flavoured olive oil.

  It’s amazing how long four days alone can be when you’ve grown used to company. I phone Anne; she has reached the Pyrenees but she is so tired that it seems her brain is still in Hemel Hempstead. She tells me that they can see the mountains and I start to hope we might have a conversation. ‘Is there snow on the mountains?’ I ask.

  ‘I can’t tell,’ she replies.

  I take it slowly. ‘Is that because it’s misty on the peaks?’

  ‘No,’ she says, ‘it’s in the summer that it’s misty.’

  ‘But you can’t tell if there’s snow on the peaks?’ I ask, unkindly.