YOUR CHEESE BOARD

GUIDELINES FOR CREATING THE PERFECT CHEESE BOARD

Liverpool Cheese Compnay staff are trained and happy to help you choose cheeses for your cheese board. Here are some guidelines which will assist you

QUANTITY

A good cheese board will only present 4-6 cheeses. More than this clutters the cheese board and may overwhelm your guests palates.

Asa rule of thumb, you will need about 45-60g of cheese per person, depending on how large the main course was and if you are going to have a dessert. Roughly speaking, therefore you would need about 300g of cheese.

TYPES

There are no hard and fast rules about which cheeses you present but you should offer a range of textures such as soft, semi-soft and hard and also different milk types, cow, sheep and goat. If you choose these cheeses with colour and shape in mind you will not go wrong. As you get ambitious, you may start to select themed cheese boards - all of the cheeses from one Country etc.

BUYING THE CHEESE

If you are shopping on a Wednesday for a dinner party on Saturday, tell us and we can help ensure that your cheeses will be ripe at the right time. A Brie for example, should be slightly chalky in the middle if it is to be perfectly ripe in a few days.

PRESENTING YOUR CHEESE

You do not need to present your cheese on a wooden board - plates, slates, baskets, marble all work well as long as it is flat and hygenic!

Whatever board you choose, try to ensure that there is enough space between the cheeses to prevent smells and flavours combining. If you place the cheeses around the board from the mildest to the strongest this should not be a problem.

You may like to decorate your board with fruit such as grapes, pears or figs. Vegetables such as celery and radishes can be effective or brunches of herbs and leaves.

When you have placed your cheeses on your board and decorated it, cover it with a slighlty damp, clean tea towel and leave it at room temperature for an hour or so.

WHEN....

Arguments rage over whether to serve the cheese board before or after dessert. Serving it before dessert, aids the transition from savoury to sweet and means that guests can continue drinking red wine.
Serving it after dessert and dessert wine means that the cheese can be taken with port so it is entirely a matter of preference.
You may decide to dispense with dessert altogther as cheese is a great palate cleaner.

ACCOMPANIMENTS

Biscuits are the choice of most as they are perfect with any cheese. You may however, prefer fresh bread or a warm speciality bread like our Italian Bisciola - an Alpine rye fruit loaf made with figs, walnuts, raisins and honey.

Other ideal accompaniments are nuts and olives or Membrillo, a quince paste from Spain eaten with Manchego but also good with other hard cheeses. (place a thin slice on top of the cheese slice and eat on a cracker)

To really impress - make your own biscuits. We have a range of recipes in the shop we will be happy to share with you.