Things To Wonder About At The Cheese Plate

Grab the toothpick with the colored cellophane tassel and press it directly, but gently, into the cube of cheddar or use the cracker to lever the brie into position and then take a bite and then say

“You know, its incredible, people have been eating dairy products for about 9000 years. Maybe more! Scientists have found ceramic pots around the Mediterranean and in Turkey and the near the Caucasus Mountains which still have residue of sheep and goat dairy proteins in them.”

I don’t know what their response will be, this isn’t usual dinner party conversation. But carry on regardless!

“I think it’s amazing that scientists can not only find that out at all but that this protein and fat can last so long on a pot shard in the ground.”

They may still be stunned but your monologue doesn’t have to last much longer…

“But only recently, like this year, have scientists in England discovered direct evidence of the consumption of dairy by finding those same proteins that were on the pots in between the teeth of some four thousand year old jaws found in England – right in the middle of the Bronze Age. The pots are indirect evidence but the teeth are absolute confirmation.”

Who knows where the conversation goes from there.

There is a great saying from the French gastronome Brillat-Savarin cheese: ‘Cheese is milk’s leap towards immortality.’ Maybe you can pitch that into your dinner party conversation at the cheese plate too. It’s a good quote.

Nine thousand years isn’t immortality but its long stretch of time in human years. The leap towards immortality has no assurance that it will land there – forever – but nine millennia is a decent length for a leap thus far. But to make that leap possible nine thousand years ago you needed to harvest clay to make pots, gather firewood to fire the pots into ceramic and, of course, you need a long standing relationship with these animals and all that goes along with that so that you and your people might continue to live. And live along side those sheep and goats.

In the establishing culture, or at least anything worthy of the name of culture, I think it is almost mandatory that there must be a hand-madeness by that somehow interacts with the earth and the creatures that live there. There is more, of course, but I think that is part of it.

These skulls and these pots with their trace milk proteins show signs that there was a real culture that involved animals in these places.

I don’t know how much of a culture we inhabit nowadays but we might have some chances to remember and practice.

Primal Derma is our little attempt to hand make some place based culture. I wouldn’t wish a leap towards immortality for you but I would wish for you to be involved in the making of a real earned culture that affirms life and death that would last a good long time.

With any fortune Primal Derma is a small part of that. A small part that works for you.

Thanks so much for your ongoing support of our little venture. We couldn’t make it without you.