Homemade Labneh Recipe–AKA tangy, thick, creamy yogurt cheese.  Serve it Middle Eastern-style as a dip with lots of olive oil and a sprinkle of good Za’atar.  Or simply use it in place of cream cheese.  Find recipe and pictures at https://www.themediterraneandish.com/homemade-labneh-recipe/

 Za’atar spice is a blend of savory dried herbs like oregano, marjoram or thyme, and earthy spices like cumin and coriander, with sesame seeds, salt and the most important ingredient of all . . . sumac!  https://www.feastingathome.com/zaatar-spice-recipe/  The Arabic word za'atar, pronounced ZAH-tahr, also means "thyme").  https://www.bonappetit.com/test-kitchen/cooking-tips/article/how-to-make-za-atar-spice-at-home  Sumac is available at Middle Eastern markets. 

Roman numerals traditionally indicate the order of rulers or ships who share the same name.  They are also sometimes still used in the publishing industry for copyright dates, and on cornerstones and gravestones when the owner of a building or the family of the deceased wishes to create an impression of classical dignity.  The Roman numbering system also lives on in our languages, which still use Latin word roots to express numerical ideas.  A few examples:  unilateral, duo, quadricep, septuagenarian, decade, milliliter.  Placing any smaller number in front of any larger number indicates subtraction.  Larger numbers were indicated by putting a horizontal line over them, which meant to multiply the number by 1,000.  Find meanings of I, V, X, L, C, D and M at http://www.novaroma.org/via_romana/numbers.html

                    

Gertie the Dinosaur is a 1914 American animated short film by Winsor McCay.  Although not the first animated film, as is sometimes thought, it was the first cartoon to feature a character with an appealing personality.  The appearance of a true character distinguished it from earlier animated “trick films”, such as those of Blackton and Cohl, and makes it the predecessor to later popular cartoons such as those by Walt Disney.  The film was also the first to be created using keyframe animation.  The film has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry, and was named #6 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time in a 1994 survey of animators and cartoon historians by Jerry Beck.  Link to the 12:18 video at https://publicdomainreview.org/collections/gertie-the-dinosaur-1914/  Animation begins at 6:30.

February 28, 2018  FOR MANY WINEMAKERS, CONCRETE IS THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS by Courtney Schiessl   For years, oak was the stamp of quality winemaking.  Oaked reds were more likely to get top scores by wine critics in the 1980s; and by the 1990s, winemakers sought out ways to impart oak flavors using oak chips and shavings.  But over the past decade, taste trends have shifted. That’s not to say that oak has disappeared in the cellar, but more consumers now seek wines without oak.  Winemakers are thus cutting back on new oak usage, and some brands release bottles labeled “unoaked” or “lightly oaked.”  Stainless steel vessels are the most popular options for unoaked wines, but recently winemakers have varied their preferences in the cellar.  Over the past decade, more winemakers have started using concrete tanks, a fermentation and aging alternative that offers the best of both steel and oak.  The trend has taken hold in both the Old and New Worlds, where many winemakers feel that concrete’s sturdiness and quality of wine produced outweighs the upfront cost and bulk of the tanks.  Historic Bordeaux producer Domaine de Chevalier installed 10 large concrete tanks in 2014, and Argentinian winery El Enemigo exclusively uses concrete eggs for fermentation.  And in case it seems like concrete tanks may just be a fashion, know that the trend dates all the way back to the ceramic amphorae of ancient Greek and Roman times.  https://vinepair.com/articles/concrete-tanks-winemaking/

Going back into the history of fermentation can be quite a wild ride, especially when considering just how much has changed.  In the days when the ancients first approached the magic of fermentation, a variety of materials were experimented with.  Clay and concrete, for example, were commonly employed before metal and other materials came to popularity, and would continues to be used commonly today.  While seldom utilized anywhere in the world on a grand scale anymore, these materials are experiencing a bit of a resurgence in modern craft brewing thanks in large part to experimental breweries attempting to trace the roots of their art all the way back to whence it first began.  Take Ohio’s Great Lakes Brewing Company, for example, where clay fermentation vessels used to recreate ancient an Sumerian brew is the highlight of the tour.  Dogfish Head Brewery, one of the largest craft producers in the country, has gained plenty of recognition for the popularization of “ancient ales,” including the brewery’s take on what is claimed to be the oldest-known fermented beverage in the world, sold commercially as Chateau Jiahu.  Eric Neilson  http://beverage-master.com/article/the-then-and-now-of-fermentation-tanks/

To give up the ghost means to expire or die, or in the case of a mechanical object, to stop working.  The phrase give up the ghost may be traced back to the King James Bible, printed in the early 1600s.  The term is used in several places in the Bible.  The phrase is usually translated in these times as giving up one’s spirit, rather than ghost.   http://grammarist.com/idiom/give-up-the-ghost/

Todt Hill, Staten Island has a summit of 409.2 feet above sea level.  It is the highest point along the Atlantic coastline south of Cadillac Mountain on Desert island, Maine.  It boasts views of the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge and the Lower New York Bay.  This provides residents with spectacular views , which historically offers the most expensive real estate on Staten Island.  Lot sizes are at least 100 by 100 feet, but one can still find estates with one or more acres here.  The bucolic feeling of the area is due to many large lots, mature trees, grand homes and  open space.  The wedding scene from the original Godfather movie was filmed at 57 Carlton Place, located off Ocean Terrace.  Todt Hill also includes the private seminary of St. Charles Seminary which is offers open space and includes  a portion of the former estate of renowned architect Ernest Flagg, known as “Stone Court“.  The seminary owns the former home of Ernest Flagg, which is a NYC Landmark.  http://sitreasure.com/index_Page4015.htm

October 23, 2018  "Turning beer into vinegar is an ancient tradition,” writes Cleveland chef Jonathon Sawyer in his new cookbook, House of Vinegar: The Power of Sour.  [But] we can thank the British for popularizing it.  While most of Europe was focused on making wine and wine vinegars, the British were brewing beer and making beer vinegars.”  But everything old is new again, as they say.  So the craft beer trend that has grown in recent years has naturally taken a turn as that specialty beer gets converted into vinegar.  Fermentation (another trend in the food world that’s actually an age-old practice) is the process that unlocks the potential of the beer, the vinegar created from it, and subsequently the food you’ll make with it.  Mr. Sawyer is a rock star of the food world, making Ohio proud.  He was named Best Chef:  Great Lakes in 2015 by the James Beard Foundation, and has competed on the Food Network's Chopped Grill Masters Napa and Iron Chef Gauntlet.  And he has taken an opportunity, with this new book, to cement his legacy further by sharing the power of sour.  Mary Bilyeu  Article includes recipe for Boccanegra (Chocolate-Vinegar Cake).   https://www.toledoblade.com/a-e/food/2018/10/23/Jonathon-Sawyer-House-of-Vinegar-The-Power-of-Sour/stories/20181023001

Strict in-context zone (stay off Twitter and Facebook in this area)  Non Sequitur comic strip  October 24, 2018

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1975  October 24, 2018  297th day of the year  Word of the Day  false negative  noun  A result of a test that shows as absent something that is present.  (statistics)  A type II error (“accepting the null hypothesis when it is false”).  Wiktionary