Ages before Aesop wrote his fables, campfire stories about contrasts between city folks and their country cousins always ended with the bumpkins being wiser than the dandies. That’s because, before Safeway and Saran Wrap, the rural rubes could grow their own food and the suave sophisticates could not.

The “meek shall inherit the earth” stories have been embellished in every culture in every century, from the Bible to Green Acres to author Barbara Kingsolver’s latest book, "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life" (HarperCollins, 2007), No. 8 this week on the New York Times bestseller list.

But the moral of Beatrix Potter‘s most delightfully told “The Tale of Johnny Town-mouse” doesn’t just end with peas on the vine tasting a lot better than peas spooned out of a tin can. Her Victorian tale concludes with Miss Potter’s opinion that she -- and probably the rest of us -- would be much better off if we packed up our valises and high-tailed it out of town to the nearest hill or dale.

Having done that some years ago, I agree with Miss Potter, who fled smelly, crowded London for the unsullied Lake District, where she became a gardener and also produced some of the finest literature of any age.

A personal favorite, “The Tale of Johnny Town-mouse”, recently played itself out in my own kitchen when a friendly fellow we’ll call Town Johnny came to visit us from THE BIG CITY, also known as The Big Apple.

A New Yorker by disposition as well as residence, he had for years expressed skepticism about my country tales: Having to lock our gate at night to keep wild bulls from eating our flowers; listening to whale songs that lulled us to sleep; finding our dog’s “gifts” of wild chicken eggs, looted avocadoes, and sometimes a butchered boar’s haunch carefully placed in front of the door.

One day Town Johnny sent me an email from The Big City -- “Am coming to see for myself; should I bring food?”

Like Miss Potter’s Timmy Willie, I assured Town Johnny there would be plenty to eat -- sweet corn picked that morning, heirloom tomatoes, thick slabs of yellow fin tuna bought straight off the dock, strawberries dripping dew -- and that he should just bring himself.

But Town Johnny, being a well-mannered fellow as well as a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America and a former professional chef before he switched to manipulating cyberspace for a major corporation, arrived bearing edible gifts. The cookies, he said, came from the fanciest bakery in Astoria, N.Y, and the assorted chocolates were all the way from Belgium. Neither token was necessary; nor were they refused.

Before setting about the business of fixing dinner, I offered Town Johnny and his lovely friend, Town Jane, a tour of our little farm. But first I asked them to move their rental vehicle; being urban dwellers without wheels, they’d simply pulled in the gate and stopped in the middle of the driveway, blocking it.

“Oh!” said Town Johnny and Town Jane.

We then moved on to our quarter-acre sweet potato patch. “That’s my sweet potato patch,” I told Johnny and Jane. “Oh!” they said, again in unison, staring at football-size yams peeking out from the wild tangle of chartreuse leaves rapidly multiplying in the high-summer sun.

“And this is my begonia bush, we’ll put its pink flowers in the salad,” I explained.

“Oh!” They said, together.

Are there begonias in city salads?

“We usually have radicchio, arugula, endive and nasturtiums,” Town Johnny said. I assured him I could grow those, too; he looked relieved.

I ended our tour at our outdoor bathtub, an $89 Rubbermaid horse trough on the back porch.

“Oh!” they said, brows furrowed. They seemed dubious. I assured them that soaking in hot bubbles while watching the Milky Way was worth the goose bumps as we toweled off. I sensed an “Oh!” forming, but they caught themselves in time.

Once in my kitchen, Town Johnny regained his city self. “Do you mind if I cook for us?” he said, easing past me toward the stove.

Out went my idea of blanched corn-on-the-cob, pan-fried fish, green salad (with begonia blossoms) and strawberry pie.

Enter Chef du Jour, brandishing sharp knives and big ideas. Being a Timmy Willie, I surrendered to Town Johnny’s momentum and got out of the way.

Country bumpkins eat at sundown; city folks dine fashionably late. It takes time to whip up magic: sautéed corn fritters, poached tuna with a Thai sesame-chili-ginger sauce, butter avocado with sweet onions dressed in homemade vinaigrette, strawberries with locally-made vanilla bean ice cream, and of course, hand-carried cardamom cookies from The Big City.

We feasted at a table decorated with pink begonias. Wild bulls bellowed below, the Milky Way twinkled above. As the candles melted to nubs I suggested, as Timmy Willie had to his city friend, that after our wonderful day together, Town Johnny “will never want to live in town again.”

Alas, as Miss Potter wrote: “But he did… he said it was too quiet!!”

Bidding farewell to Town Johnny and Town Jane, we loaded them up with fresh fruit for their long journey back to The Big City. They invited us to visit them there. We thought that a grand idea.

“How do we find you?” we asked.

Together, they replied: “On the subway.”

It was our turn to say: “Oh!”

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