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Carrion Luggage  Native to the Americas, the turkey vulture (Cathartes aura) travels widely in search of sustenance. While usually foraging alone, it relies on other individuals of its species for companionship and mutual protection. Sometimes misunderstood, sometimes feared, sometimes shunned, it nevertheless performs an important role in the ecosystem. This scavenger bird is a marvel of efficiency. Rather than expend energy flapping its wings, it instead locates uplifting columns of air, and spirals within them in order to glide to greater heights. This behavior has been mistaken for opportunism, interpreted as if it is circling doomed terrestrial animals destined to be its next meal. In truth, the vulture takes advantage of these thermals to gain the altitude needed glide longer distances, flying not out of necessity, but for the joy of it. It also avoids the exertion necessary to capture live prey, preferring instead to feast upon that which is already dead. In this behavior, it resembles many humans. It is not what most of us would consider to be a pretty bird. While its habits are often off-putting, or even disgusting, to members of more fastidious species, the turkey vulture helps to keep the environment from being clogged with detritus. Hence its Latin binomial, which translates to English as "golden purifier." I rarely know where the winds will take me next, or what I might find there. The journey is the destination. |
| If it seems like I post a lot about cheese, that's because I like cheese. An important article from Food&Wine: This Is Officially the Best Cheese in the World, According to the 2025 Mondial du Fromage  A perfectly aged wheel from Switzerland triumphed over more than 1,900 entries to win Best in Show at the prestigious competition in Tours, France. You might say the wheel rolled over its competition. The 2025 Mondial du Fromage took place in mid-September in Tours, France, bringing together the global cheese trade for celebration, exposition, and competition. As much as I love cheese, and as much as I like being in France, I don't think I could have handled being there. If you think wine snobs are bad, wait'll you meet a cheese snob. Especially a French one. This year, Switzerland’s Le Gruyère AOP Vieux, crafted by Simon Miguet of Fromagerie La Côte-aux-Fées, earned Best in Show among more than 1,900 submissions. No wonder they won. They had help from the fairies. While the cheese has long been a top contender at international competitions, history was made on the cheesemonger side: for the first time, Americans took both gold and bronze. Ooof. That's gotta sting worse than when California started winning wine competitions. Comparable to Olympic gymnastics in its rigor, the contest tested every aspect of cheesemongering. “The challenges encompass every aspect of cheesemongering, from general knowledge, to blind tasting, to making exact cuts by weight, to service and presentation,” says Johnson. I know you were thinking it. So I had to include this bit to show that yes, indeed, there was a cheese-cutting competition. Having two Americans on the podium marked a breakthrough. “We have always been viewed as underdogs in the global cheese community,” says Johnson. I've long thought of the US cheese scene as a far distant cousin to that of France, Switzerland, and even the UK. But perhaps things are changing. I still don't see a lot of specialty cheeses of US origin in stores. I know they exist. Hell, there's a monastery near me that makes its own gouda for sale, much as Belgian monasteries make beer. It's highly local and small-batch, though. The monastery is, incidentally, run by nuns. Don't ask me; I don't know. Complicating matters, the generic use of “gruyère” in the U.S. allows domestic producers to flood the market under the name. “The word ‘gruyère’ has been allowed to be used out of context,” Moskowitz explains. “Le Gruyère AOP is a protected cheese from Switzerland, but the word ‘gruyère’ by itself in the U.S. is like ‘cheddar,’ and the market is about to be flooded with domestic gruyère.” And yes, this is akin to the use of "sparkling wine" to denote fizzy wine from outside the Champagne region. As far as I'm aware, there's no international body enforcing AOPs or AOCs, though. The UN has other things to do, I suppose. All the French can really do is look down upon the American upstarts with scorn, but they're going to do that regardless of what we call our cheese. |
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