Cathars, Miracles and the Blessings for Cheesemakers

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Travel snapshot, near the Ardeche, a tourist-free zone of France, maybe a couple hours northwest of Avignon.

Cathars, the medieval heretics who doubted Christ's divinity, yet believed that humans could reach spiritual perfection, once marched on
these hills. The ghosts of Troubadors, whom some say invented the western concept of Romantic love, still roam the fields of lavender and sunflowers.

The sunlight here is aqueous, you feel it flood over you; and the soil is protected from chemicals by the locals. The vintners refuse to artificially irrigate their vineyards: it is up to Nature, they believe, to give drink to the vines. It is Nature's whim to decide how sweet or tart or pungent or oakey the grapes will become this year. The mount of water in each field, which also means the sugar content of each grape, is something to be determined by the Rain Gods alone.

The goat cheese artisan has prospered since we first met him two years ago. On a small pile of land down the road from the wild boars, a stone's throw from the spring where miracles occur, ( pregnancy for the infertile; wisdom for the inflexible), he has now built a house, gained a wife and child, constructed a small, germ-free rural laboratory where the secrets of his craft are guarded, and practiced, and protected.

He is young, lithe, long-haired, with the shadow of a secret smile on his face. He reminds me of a juggler, with a juggler's relaxed yet coiled physical presence while at rest.

But there is something unworldly about him (as there is about all goats): an earthy airiness that hints in posture, gesture, and a particular glint in the eye that life is mostly a riddle and a jest (as all goats tell).

He is an alchemist, a magician of substances, creating savory morsels out of what might have become putrid waste under the guidance of someone less knowledgeable and inspired.

We have a choice of one day old goat cheese, or two day old goat cheese. In either case the cheese is rolled in ash. I don't know why.

Perhaps it is a joke....

Blessed be the cheesemakers.

Indeed, blessed be the entire dairy industry.

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