At Uncle Jarjoura's... the Tempting Country "Arous"!

The country "arous"?! No traveler from Beirut to Damascus, or from Damascus to Beirut, can help stopping a moment before "Jarjoura's" shop in Zabdal, next to Chtaura... to order an "arous with labneh" or an arous with cheese!! He stands waiting his turn, watching Uncle Jarjoura's son spread the white labneh generously and sprinkle over it, temptingly, the golden oil... then, with two deft hands, roll the sheet of marqouq bread into an appetizing, nut-brown "bride"... and hand it to the customer — nothing tastier, nothing more delicious!!

And the "country arous," whether with labneh, or with oil and za'tar, or with figs and sugar, is a Lebanese invention perhaps as old as this Mountain! Our grandfathers loved it and handed it down to us. And Uncle Jarjoura is perhaps the only one among the owners of the dairy shops who has proudly preserved this charming invention in an age when the modern "sandwich" has swept in and lorded it over all...

The secret of his success: Many are the shops in Lebanon that busy themselves with dairy products of every kind, for the local consumption of these goods is great... But the secret of Uncle Jarjoura's success, and the source of his fame, go back to several causes, chief among them the sound scientific basis and the long experience that stretches back thirty-five years — and then that personal gift for mastering the craft and serving the trade with love and devotion...

His wit and lightness of spirit: Nor shall we forget Uncle Jarjoura's charm, his cheerfulness, and his lightness of spirit. He is always smiling, always quick with a retort. Ask him a question and the answer comes back rhymed, without the least effort. Call to him from outside the shop: — "Where are you, Jarjoura?"

and the reply comes at once: — "Welcome, welcome —

in the picture!"

If you turn to your companion to introduce Jarjoura's cheese, and he says to you:
— "His cheese has quite a name!..." he finishes for you on the spot: — "None like it in the whole wide world!"

And the light banter runs on in this fashion:
— "Make me an arous!"
— "Specially for you!"
— "How much a kilo?"
— "Whatever you reckon — carry it off!"

And if you have a camera with you for taking pictures and you say to him:
— "We're going to take a film" — he answers you with a question:
— "Me alone, or with the boys?!"

The story of the shop: I said that Uncle Jarjoura's acquaintance with dairy-making goes back thirty-five years, to the days when he was still a boy and his feet carried him from the village of Ras al-Harf, near Bhamdoun, to Taanayel, to work on the farms of the Jesuits — from them he took the craft according to its rules. The first to appreciate his dairy goods — cheese, cream, and butter — and to consume them, was the Massabki Hotel in Chtaura, an important center for tourists — and for "brides"! — which helped spread his renown.

Uncle Jarjoura tells the history of the shop in these words: — We built the house and set up our business here in 1928. The family lived on the upper floor and the workshop was on the ground floor, and from that day the trade has gone steadily forward, thanks be to God... more than we deserve!... And last year we finished building this new shop...

Father of seven children: You are taken by Uncle Jarjoura's simplicity and by the happiness that reigns over every member of his family. He tells you how he married in 1917, and the fruits of this marriage are four grown sons and three girls... Some are married, some help him in the shop, one is studying at the Lebanese University and another at the Jesuit college... and all of them are bright of face from sheer good health, and serene of brow from sheer peace of mind.

He processes 400 kilos of milk a day:
You may gasp with astonishment when you learn that the shop's daily intake of milk amounts to 400 kilos, of which 300 kilos are turned into labneh and one hundred kilos into cheese, while from the whey of the cheese he makes qarisheh. But you will surely be convinced after standing a while counting the customers coming and going — from Damascus or Zahle or Beirut or any place in the mountains — to provision their houses with labneh, cheese, sweet qarisheh, and butter! He packs them in large, tightly closed containers of waxed cardboard. No wonder the number of customers on summer days sometimes passes the hundred...

Where does he get the milk? He collects the milk from the neighboring farms, which are many and thriving in the Bekaa... "Buying it beats raising it," says Uncle Jarjoura, "because tending a hundred cows to secure our needs is a business in itself — and why should I take on that worry, so long as milk is always at hand and in plenty?... I buy the kilo at 30–40 piasters, according to the season; in winter, of course, it is dearer than in the other seasons."

Uncle Jarjoura closes his talk by saying that all the milk he consumes is pure cow's milk... "We never touch the milk at all; we buy the cream specially for making the butter. Our motto, along with cleanliness and fine workmanship, is honesty in the work — and that is why people come crowding to buy what we make."