These sweet and tasty 'cigars' are easy to make and delicious. Photo: David Reist
So I'm back again, at the interstate bus terminal, waiting for another of our vintage crew to arrive. I'm playing "Spot the winemaker". I messed up last week, as the graduate winemaker from San Francisco wasn't the flowers-in-your-hair kinda guy I was expecting. Waiting out the front of the YHA for me was more a dapper, well-moustached, Ricky Gervais-type character.
This time, my new arrival is French, so that is so much easier; striped shirt, beret, smells of garlic, right? Wrong again, and he looks nothing like Asterix the Gaul either. Makes you wonder what people expect before you meet for the first time. I said to our incoming Frenchman: look for grey hair, George Clooney on a bad day.
Ultimately, the stained red hands are the giveaway and, given the time of year, looking tired and slightly crazy will also help us hook up. The same kind of issue came up the other day. A beekeeper was coming out to have a chat and I wondered what he would look like. He makes natural, wild honey so there's a chance he'll be all rugged-looking, unkempt and smell of beeswax. Put it this way, I'm pretty certain he won't be in a Canali suit.
Preparing the filling for Bryan Martin's "cigars". Photo: David Reist
Tim Malfroy is an interesting guy, so laid-back with magnificent mutton-chops, bright eyes, totally engrossed in, and enthusiastic for, his chosen profession – that of tending bees in a natural way. What's that I hear you ask? Don't bees do it naturally anyway? Sure, but it's more the fact that Malfroy lets the bees form their own comb rather than inserting plastic, sterilised combs to collect the honey. The hives are not moved around, so rather than taking the bees' nest to the flowers, these bees have to find it themselves. They will travel vast distances and presumably get to know their district, rather than waking up and thinking "Where the hell are we now?" (in bee talk obviously).