Why Jackie French does not like cypresses

Yes, other driveway trees die. But most are more leafy and less regimented and the absence of one just gives a pleasing informality and sense of potential. One day a tree will grow there again.

But that's not what I really hate about cypresses. Cypresses don't sing.

Never heard a tree sing? Wait till the next wind comes along and listen. Every tree has its own song – hooching, whooshing, rattling, creaking, sighing or even all at once. The patter of leaves, the whisper of branches. In suburbs they create white noise, helping to drown out the background mutter of traffic or the street's TV sets.

Cypresses just sway. Until they crack and you are left with a broken cypress like a snapped match. And it will never grow straight and perfect again.

Possibly all cypress lovers have already stopped reading this and are either muttering imprecations again cypress haters or having a restorative cup of tea and a bikkie before defiantly planting more. But for those of you who do like them … or even love them (and are still here) … I admit that in certain wide landscapes, especially Italian ones, they can look stunning. Watch the lines of them get larger as you drive or walk nearer and nearer, see them wind around a driveway and know they will just grow up and up and not need trimming, pruning or leaf raking.

Cypresses come, of course, in many forms, from fat to triangular to elegantly columnar. There are new varieties of cypress too though, not being a cypress fancier, I've never paid much attention to them – apart from noting the claims that they grow faster and are less likely to have a single one in your neat driveway go and die on you, leaving a gap that can't be replaced for a decade or possibly ever, as it will always be a different age and even shape from the others, as each year shapes trees in different ways, as wind blows or drought stunts or a good year leaves a longer gap between sets of branches.

There is one cypress I (almost) reliably admire, the blue-green Italian Cypress or Pencil Pine (Cupressus sempervirens 'Glauca'). Actually I wholeheartedly adore them in the Italian landscape, where the soft blue melds with the Italian sky and the shapes are a counterpoint to the hills. And … possibly … there are stretches of Australia where the thin elegant form of Italian cypresses looks stunning, tall and elegant in a long avenue or driveway. Stunning and elegant, yes, but still not comparable to a more shaggy glory of red gums or the varied white barks and twisted branches of snow gums, or even alternating red and green leaved plums or crab apples …

But back to cypresses. If you want the elegant Italian look – especially if you are an elegant Italian, or married to one, like my niece, the blue-green Italian cypress is probably the best, and 'Glauca' the best of the best. It's possibly the narrowest of all the cypresses, taking up very little horizontal space. It is also faster growing than the older form. Give them water and food and a touch of mulch and you may get three metres in three years. Ignore them, and they may even decide not to die on you. (No surety about this one, but there are worse plants for heat and droughts).

They'll eventually grow to about 20 neat metres, needing no pruning unless a branch turns brown, in which case cut it out before the canker spreads into the trunk and cross your fingers. They do need full sun – pencil pines in semi-shade get shaggy, daggy or even deceased.

Grow them in straight lines for best effect, on either side of a driveway or avenue, or at least gently curving – they do need a strictly defined shape for their pathway.

Of course you need an architecturally elegant house to match the trees. Not necessarily an Italian palazzo – they do go well with the modern metal blue corrugated iron look, the colours and shades and even slight reflection from the leaves matching the metal cladding on the walls and roof nicely.

Perhaps you need to be truly elegant yourself to love pencil pines. Able to wear stockings without snagging them, high heels without falling over and pencil skirts without forgetting your knees are bound and tripping over small dogs or children. But can pencil pines ever evoke the passion of an avenue of gum trees? Or cherry blossom? Maybe if you are Italian.

I need to ask my niece.

* hunting for a frog with a voice like Placido Domingo imitating chopping wood outside my study window – that frog is LOUD, and the mystery of its species still unsolved;

* watching one variety of winter-blooming red hot pokers fade and another variety begin to bloom … and the spinebill loves them all;

* plotting tomatoes – OK, it will be hot, may not rain and the creek may become polluted but a summer without even TRYING to have home-grown tomatoes … impossible;

* falling in love with a "pleached church" made of interwoven leaves and branches – hunt it out on the web – if you are looking for a project for the next 20 years, this might be it;

* picking limes; and

* refraining myself from making lime butter as we still have a bucket of it left in the freezer from last year – and I don't even know yet if it freezes well. Better to make fresh lemon butter just before we eat it.

I have been craving soup. Soothing soup, nutrient rich soup, the kind of soup that warms you up and gives your knees the energy to walk up the mountain or your fingers enthusiasm enough to tap the keys. This week, this one is it.

1 tbsp olive oil
4 red onions, chopped
1 bulb garlic
4 litres chicken stock (home-made in you have any in the freezer)
2 chicken thighs, skinned and chopped into chunks
1 tbsp brown or palm sugar
juice two limes
2 carrots, peeled and grated
a bunch fresh thyme
6 leaves kale, preferably red or crinkly, chopped into chunks, stems and all

Saute onion and garlic in the oil till very, very soft – don't let it brown or blacken or it will be bitter. Remove and brown the chicken – browned, sticky bits on the base are good. When thoroughly brown add the stock and onion and garlic and simmer, scraping the bottom to incorporate the brown bits.

Simmer for 20 minutes. Add all the rest, simmer five minutes then hoik out the thyme before it begins to taste like cough medicine.

Eat hot, in very large bowls, with rye bread and butter. Or not, if you are feeling calorifically virtuous.

Sore throats need tomato soup. The trouble is that when you are crook enough for emergency tomato soup there may none in the garden and no containers of last summer's harvest buried in the freezer.

So this is a cheat's way of doing it. It's fast and good and warming and if it's not as good as that tomato gazpacho last summer or the carefully combined, long-simmered stock with frozen puree at this time of year, with a sore throat, you're probably not capable of appreciating gourmet subtleties.

Sip this – lots of it – and be comforted.

Place in a large pot:

4 onions, peeled and roughly chopped
4 carrots, peeled
1 bulb garlic peeled (or as much as you have the strength to manage)
6 litres chicken stock
2 large potatoes, peeled
6 tbsp butter
2 large or 4 small cans of tomatoes

Boil 20 minutes. Puree the lot.

Add a sprinkle of herbs on hand, but not mixed herbs or dried oregano or you will create a flavour remarkably like canned soup. Frozen basil, fresh oregano, a sprinkle of thyme leaves … whatever is readily available and flavour packed.

Serve hot. It also freezes well. For up to three months. Thaw well and simmer for 10 minutes before serving, stirring well so it doesn't catch on the bottom of the pan.