GMOs are everywhere…at least in the USA
Although many people are not aware of it, almost all the processed food sold in the US contains Genetically Modified Organisms.  This according to an article by Amy Harmon and Andrew Pollack in the New York Times.  If that makes you nervous, it may (or may not) help to know that the USDA has said that GMO foods, such as soy beans, wheat, corn, tomatoes and alfalfa,  are safe for human consumption, saying that they are effectively identical from a health standpoint to their non-GMO cousins.

Not So Fast
At the same time, many scientists beg to differ, saying that there is not yet enough data to determine whether or not GMOs pose a health threat.  Some have gone so far as to suggest that Argo-business has engaged in a massive coverup of research  showing the negative health impacts of GMOs (check out Jeffery Smith’s book  “Seeds of Deception” for just one example).  The Queen of the Sun, a recent film that discusses the shocking deterioration of America’s bee population, strongly suggests that GMOs are at least one possible cause for the so-called Colony Collapse Disorder.

To Label Or Not to Label
Regardless what people believe about the health concerns related to GMOs, it seems that most  support the idea of labeling foods that contain them.  According to a 2010 Thomson-Reuters-NPR poll, 9 out of 10 Americans said they wanted GMO foods to be labeled.  The European Union began requiring labels on food products that contain GMOs in 2003.  Labeling bills have been proposed  (and defeated) in the legislatures of twelve different U.S. states.  According to Jefferey Smith, Argo-industry giants like Monsanto have not only opposed labeling of GMO food, but have also fought labels indicating foods that are GMO free, saying that such labels would act as a stigma for other foods.

People to have a say
This Fall for the first time, a labeling law will be put to a public vote in the U.S..  In November, Californians will vote on a ballot initiative that would require all foods that contain GMOs to be labeled.  Since California’s economy is huge (if it were a nation, California would be the 8th largest economy in the world), any labeling law passed in California is likely to have a correspondingly huge impact on the future of labeling throughout the U.S.

This is a vote to follow very closely.

As comments at the end of the article point out, it is not only through their meat that chemicals fed to chickens can enter the human food chain.  The bi-products of factory chickens are routinely returned used in other areas of industrial farming.  Feather and bone meals are used in livestock and fish feed.  Chicken droppings are spread on fields as fertilizer and often end up in groundwater and rivers via run off.  It is easy to see how these chemicals can end up in our food and water.

Perhaps more horrifying than the impact on the food chain are the reasons why farm chickens are fed these chemicals.

Caffeine?  So that the chickens will not sleep but instead stay awake to eat and thereby grow faster.

Benadryl?  To calm down chickens stressed out by factory farm conditions (and maybe by all the caffeine).

Antibiotics?  Well consider the living conditions for chickens on a factory farm.

Arsenic?  To make chicken meat, which would otherwise be grey due to poor quality food, look pink.

Anyone for a chicken nugget?

On Visiting Farms
To me, there is no better way to really understand a product than to visit the place were it is made.  Whether the product in question is cheese, hams, sausages, wine or any other artisan product, understanding how and why it tastes like it does always begins with geography.  Just as the soil, the sun exposure, the elevation and the character of the country side where a wine is produced all play a role in how it finally tastes in the glass, so it is also true that all these elements have a huge part to play in the taste of a cheese.  This is true, at least, for the best wines and cheeses, when the wine maker or the cheese maker works with respect to tradition and lets the flavor of his wonderful raw materials shine through.

Visiting a farm in France can be a bit of a tricky business.  I have visited farms in France on many occasions, and under many different circumstances, ranging from cold call visits to visits made possible by a formal letter of introduction.  Let me assure you that, despite what the promotional “cheese route” maps and local tourism offices say, just driving up to a farm and asking to see what they do is almost always awkward.  Lets face it, farming is hard work that more than fills the day, and any farm large enough to have a person on staff to just deal with visitors is generally too big and industrial to be much fun to visit.

A better option is calling ahead to make sure that a visit would be welcome and well timed, although this also can be tricky depending on your French skills.  If one feels comfortable enough to make the  necessary arrangement in French, the results are usually gratifying.  In the late ’90’s we spent a lovely afternoon at the home of a cheese maker in Rocamadour based on a nothing more than a pretty shaky phone call the day before.  After a lengthy tour of the farm and cheese making facilities, we were sent on our way with a bag full of tender little goat cheese disks and tickets to the Musée de la Monnaie in nearby Bergerac, where a relative of the cheese maker, a security guard there had provided complimentary passes.

However, by far, the king of farm visits are those where someone you know, who also knows the farmer, has made a personal introduction.  In this circumstance, it can be difficult to believe the warmth and generosity of the reception that one often receives.  During a visit to a winemaker in Sancerre many years ago, a personal introduction  from the wines American importer resulted in our being invited to a multi-course lunch after touring the vineyards and wine making facilities. With a personal introduction, ou never know exactly what to expect, but a very polite welcome is the bare minimum.

Our visit to Ferme Kukulu was scheduled at the farm-friendly hour of 9am, which meant that we would have to get an early start since the farm, nestled among the rolling foothills of the Pyrenees Atlantique, is over an hour from our house in Orthez.  Morning fog meant that we arrived a few minutes late, even though we allowed plenty of time.

Our guide for the visit was Mayi, who works in the tiny office that is the brains of the operation.  She welcomed us to the farm by letting us know that, until 1985, when the paved road to the farm was built, Kukulu was a “ferme isolé” or isolated farm reached only by horses, oxen and mules (or I suppose in 1985, they had 4 wheel drive vehicles?).

100 Years of Cheese Making Tradition:
The Hiriart family has made raw milk cheeses in the traditional style of the Basque Pyrenees since 1900.  Madame Hiriart is currently the matriarch of the family, and she still runs the the tiny cheese shop on site.

Cheese that begins with Sheep:
A visit to any fromagerie ought to begin with the animals, as this is where the process begins.  Ferme Kukulu now has about 2000 sheep, which I believe qualifies them as small to mid sized for this region.  They no longer raise the local Tete Noir breed of sheep but instead favor the Lacaune breed that is native to the region where Roquefort cheese is produced, 2-3 hours distant in South-Central France.

During the period when the animals are giving milk, they are kept in barns for reasons of hygiene (to facilitate inspection and testing…a concession to the regulations of European Union hygiene rules).  During this period they are fed on organic, non GMO grain and hay which is grown  locally.  During the rest of the year, they are allowed to feed on the grasses, herbs and flowers of the surrounding countryside.

All  of their practices in regard to the raising and utilization of these sheep are geared toward respecting their health, seasonality and happiness.  As the farms motto states, “A happy sheep is a sheep that reproduces and provides milk” (my translation).

The farm also has several hundred goats, and 4 or five cow, all of whom provide milk for cheeses made either in combination with sheep’s milk or on their own.

In recent years, the use of raw milk in the production of their cheeses  has necessitated a major investment for Kukulu.  It was necessary to install new cheese making “laboratory” to insure conformity to the strict hygiene standards set by the  European Union.  This modern equipment, coupled with constant independent testing of  the milk and all  cheese made from it at several stages during its production and aging, insures the safety of the final product.  However, these practices only serve to reinforce a message that French people have known for years:  high quality raw milk cheeses are not a health hazard and, on the contrary, contain beneficial bacteria that strengthen the bodies immune system.

The people at Kukulu all seemed very proud of the cheeses they make and very happy to tell us all about the process.  During our visit to the cheese making laboratory, we watched the cheese maker filling molds with the still warm cheese curds from that mornings milk.  When he noticed us watching, he motioned to us through the window,  asking  in pantomime if we would like to taste the curd.  He joined us in the observation area minutes later, with a colander full of warm, sweet, sheep-y curds.  At first the individual curds separated easily from the pile, but as the curds cooled they began to coagulate into a coherent mass, just as they would when the cheeses are formed.

Uniformly, the people working on the farm seemed most surprised to learn that people in Seattle are interested in and enjoy their cheeses.  Exportation is a recent development for Kukulu;  for people who until recently made a product that seldom traveled beyond Bordeaux, Seattle seems very far off.

The cheeses from Ferme Kukulu are featured from time to time on the cheese board at Le Pichet and Cafe Presse;  these are limited production, seasonal cheeses (as is the case with many of the raw milk cheeses we offer) so it is hard to make any promises.  If you do notice them when you dine with us, I hope you will share the feeling of connection with this distant artisan when you taste their cheese.

Café Presse has the great privilege to host French Natural Wine Star Pierre Breton, for a 3 course family-style meal showcasing his remarkable wines on Thursday, March 1, 2012.  He and his wife, Catherine, took over their vineyards in the Loire Valley in 1989 and are leaders in the organic and biodynamic wine movement in France.  This is a remarkable opportunity to meet Pierre and find out more about his internationally sought-after wines.

Seating is very limited!  Please call 206.709.7674 for reservations.

$50.00/person does not include tax or gratuity.  6:30 P.M.

Menu:

Chèvre chaud sur crouton et sa salade à la frisée
“Warm goat’s milk cheese on grilled bread with curly endives, fines herbes and a walnut-cider vinaigrette”

Poulet rôti et son gratin aux pommes de terre, choux-fleur et champignons
“Natural Washington State chicken roasted to order, served with a creamy gratin of potatoes, cauliflower and mushrooms”

Clafoutis aux prunes et a l’Armagnac
“Dense vanilla custard cake with prunes and Armagnac, served warm with whipped cream”

Saturday November 5, 2011:

We got wind of an all-organic exposition and fair going on at the Parc Floral located at the Bois de Vincennes (saw it in the PariScope, the weekly guide to all things entertainment, arts and culture going on in Paris;  where else would you find this sort of thing?).  It is called the “Salon Marjolaine” and it runs from the 5 to the 13^th of November.  It sounded like fun and the weather promised to be at least workable, so why not take a walk in the park and see what this event was all about?

The Bois de Vincennes to the east,  along with the Bois de Boulogne to the west, are a pair sprawling parks that bookend the city of Paris and provide it with its most utilized spaces for outdoor activities.  The Bois de Vincennes includes a medieval donjon, a renaissance chateau, a zoo, a floral garden, a grandstand for concerts, a lake with paddleboats and canoes, and acres of lovely tree lined lanes for strolling or pique-nique-ing or playing boules or just sitting on a bench.  It also includes a cluster of pavilions that are used for a wide range of exhibitions, events, parties, festivals and conventions.  The setting could not be more promising for a celebration of all things green;  on emerging from the metro at Chateau de Vincennes, one follows the crowds on a 15 minute walk through the park, along trails signed with information about the biodiversity found in the wilds of Paris, to reach the event.  Although the day was grey, fall foliage enlivened the scene.

I am not exactly sure why the event is called the Salon Marjolaine, but the range of organic (or “biologique” in French) products on display and for sale was truly inspiring.  From the utilitarian (solar panels; rainwater barrels, garden equipment, green heating units for the home) to the functional (clothing, shoes, baby products, bedding, pillows, kitchen wares and tools) to the educational (books, manuals, guides, teaching supplies, puzzles, toys, posters)to the artistic (recycled-materias sculpture, ceramics, stained glass, artisan baskets, furniture, bird calls), to health and grooming supplies (soaps, acupuncture, essential oils, vitamins, massage), to the frankly difficult to understand what they are for (Horse milk?  Royal jelly from honey bees? Giant salt crystal lamps?) to things I don’t really want explained to me any more clearly (something called a “dry toilet”).

The highlight for me was the selection of artisan food products and ready to eat food offerings, all 100% organic.  Wine, alcohols, cider, cheese, charcuterie, bread, fish conserves, chocolate, honey,  foie gras, coffee, spices;  the list goes on and on and included many items that, the fact that organic versions existed was news to me.

Most of the booths selling hot food to eat on the spot hedged toward the vegetarian, like the young couple selling pumpkin soup with curry, gruyere and croutons as well as sweet, dense pumpkin cake, or a booth offering a stir-fry of heirloom root vegetables.  But meat eaters found many offerings as well;  I especially liked the booth grilling whole baby lambs over glowing coals.  In a strange marketing choice, the front of the booth featured numerous photos of the adorable critters frolicking in the pasture with their elders  in happier days.

It seemed to me that an overarching sense of good will, festivity and cooperation surrounded the event, lending it the feel of a carnival for former hippies.  Just about every eco friendly idea i had every heard of was represented by a both at this event.  The crowd was a pleasant mix of young idealists, old people walking arm in arm (many more old people than I expected) and families on an outing with children.  The feeling of festival was furthered by the small groups of attendees who actually chose to dress in costume for the event, as if they were on the way to a Sci-Fi convention (the most heavily represented groups were inhabitants of the planet Pandora, followed closely by hobbits).   Altogether, a silly and enjoyable celebration of a very serious idea.