The milk of the flocks is made into butter, and that in turn is often cooked down into what we should call clarified butter, but which the Arabs call _semen_. It will keep a year and is much used in cooking, especially in preparing rice. There is a very pleasant, cooling preparation of milk called _leben_,[89] which is thick and has a slightly acid taste. It looks like junket. A little of it, when put into slightly warmed milk and set away in a warm place for a few hours, will make leben of the milk. The process is one of partial digestion and makes a wholesome food for invalids, particularly for those suffering from fevers. _Lebbeneh_ is strained _leben_ to which a little salt has been added. It is a sort of compromise between butter and cheese. A cream cheese, _jiben_, is made in square cakes averaging the size of a man’s hand. These cakes are put away in brine for keeping and, when needed, are soaked in hot water. Many meals are made of wheat bread and cheese. Hard, dried leben, pressed into little balls, may be kept for months. It is then called _kishk_. When they are to be used the balls are cracked into little fragments and soaked in water. ----- ----- Eggs, mutton and goat’s meat are obtainable in most villages. For game, the gazel, pigeon, quail and partridge, as well as smaller birds, are shot and used by a few of the peasants. For those who live near the Sea of Tiberias (Galilee), the fish there found add to the variety.[90] In parts of Palestine locusts are eaten.[91] They are usually dried or roasted. A story and a proverb are mentioned concerning the vigor and spryness of these insects. A man who was in great haste and yet wished something to eat caught a locust and, holding it by the legs, roasted it over a fire. He didn’t wait to do it very thoroughly before he put it in his mouth. Fearing that it would burn him he delayed shutting his teeth together on it. The moment he loosened the grasp of his fingers, therefore, away went the locust. Now for the proverb: “Âflat min jarâdeh,” which means, “Better at escaping than a locust.” ----- ----- Baked dishes are not common among the peasantry. Boiling, roasting and frying are the common modes of preparing food. _Kibbeh_ is a mixture of meat and burghul, bruised together in a mortar until it becomes a jellied mass, when it is pressed into pans, scored off into cakes and fried with semen. _Maḳlûbeh_ is a preparation of rice and eggplant cooked in a deep dish, and, when served, turned out, upside down; whence the name, which means “turned over.” _Keftah_ is a meat cake fried in semen, not very different from Hamburg steak. _Mujedderah_, or _‛aṣîdeh_, is a mixture of rice and lentils. Sometimes fried onion scraps are served with it.