Page 73 of Why Cheese?
After he puts out most of the fire under the vats, he pulls a mess of old coffee cans from the cabinets. Every one has a piece of tape with labels like “s. lacticus” and “p. roqueforti.” Roq pries off one lid, then he takes a tiny measuring spoon and shakes the powder in. “About fifty milligrams or so will do for this batch. I use a blend of five different cultures.” One by one, he carefully closes a tin, opens another, then adds a dash of the new powder.
“For god’s sake man, let her do something,” Cam calls. He dumps into the sink an armful of metal tins that look like springform pans with holes drilled through them. Brie sighs and takes over scrubbing them down as Cam leans back against the trough. “She’s never going to learn if you do it all for her. Or is your perfectionist pride too fragile to risk it?”
Roq blisters at Cam’s cut. He shoves the next can into my shocked hands. Doing my best to not shake, I pull open the lid and am hit by the smell of yeasty cheese.
You’re going to ruin this. You’ll add too much and the whole thing will turn into clotted garbage.
“How…? How much?” I ask, locking the canister in my arm so I don’t drop it or fling the whole thing into the vat.
With a sigh, Roq darts his gaze to Cam, then he picks up the tiny spoon. “Use this.”
I dig it in, and he shakes his head. “Too much, too much. Okay. Ah, a little more. Good. Now add it in.”
Taking a deep breath, I toss the granules into the warm milk.
“A bit more celebratory than I tend to, but…good job. You just have three more cultures to go.”
Feeling more secure, I’m able to get through the mess of cans while Roq watches like a hawk without any major disasters. He passes me a large wooden paddle to give the mixture a good stir while he quickly adds other cultures to the second vat. The heat from the warm milk is invigorating, and I’m drawn in by the sweep of the wooden handle through the still, opaque surface.
Didn’t queens bathe in milk and honey? I used to find the idea ludicrous and kinda nasty, but slipping into this vat—maybe while Cam and Cheddy feed me grapes—sounds fantastic.
A hand lands on my shoulder, pinning me to the step stool. “That’s good.” Roq takes the paddle and hangs it on a rack above our heads. The excess milk drips back into the vat as we stare.
“What now?”
“We wait for the cultures to acidify the milk.”
“For how long?”
Roq tugs over the chair. He sits with elbows on his knees and fingers tented. Focusing on the vats, he mouths from the side of his lips, “An hour and a half. Give or take.”
Great. What am I going to do for an hour and…
Leaping in the air, Cheddy slaps his palms over Cam’s shoulders, then Brie’s. Both men turn and spray a hose at Cheddy. Rather than recoil, Cheddy poses like he’s in a shower. Water drenches his body until every naked inch of skin glistens like diamonds.
That’ll do.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Pecorino Romano Pecker
“SUMER IS ICUMEN in, lhude sing cuccu.” Cheddy’s infectious baritone echoes across every brick in the room. I don’t have a clue what he’s singing, but his cheeks are rosy and his eyes tight as he pulls up on a handle for a machine that looks like a cheese torture device. Cloth dangles over the sides like a bridal veil.
“Groweþ sed and…” Cheddy’s voice strains as he hefts up a pail filled with water. “…bloweþ med.Ah.” He hangs the bucket from the farthest notch on the handle, then he places his hands on his waist and sings out, “and springþ þe wde nu. Sing cuccu.Oh hi, Vi.”
I’d been doing my best to keep out of everyone’s way while the cheese cultures itself. Brie let me help clean a little before he was ordered to do something else by Roq. Cam kept drifting in and out, always offering me a nibble of his cheese despite him having none in his hand. But then he too was sent up to help clean and organize the store for Tuesday. It left him grumbling about how Roq was just trying to keep me all to himself while I followed the strange song from the back of the cellar.
Accepting I’ve been found out, I say, “I didn’t know you could sing.”
“All knights can.”
“Is it part of knight training between jousting, sword fighting, and dragon slaying?”
Cheddy laughs and wipes his hands off on a mess of cheesecloth. “Not exactly. We pick it up, long roads, bawdy taverns with bawdier women. If you don’t sing, you’re worth less than a squire.”
“I didn’t, um, recognize your song?”
“It’s old. My mum loved it. She’d sing it every planting season, harvest, winter. Sometimes summer too.” He smiles wide at the thought, but his hands clench the cloth like he intends to strangle it.
