Haven Extras – Autumn 15

The perfect cheese board

Nothing pleases quite like a well-curated cheese board. Follow these tips the next time you serve cheese to guarantee you’ll look like a true fromage aficionado.

Select: the first thing to remember is to aim for a balance of textures (soft to hard), flavours (mild to strong), colours and shapes. Most cheeses fall into one of four categories: soft (creamy brie, camembert and Brillat-Savarin), firm (Manchego and Parmigiano-Reggiano), aged (Gouda, cheddar and Gruyère) or blue (Stilton, Gorgonzola). While blue cheese doesn’t appeal to all, a good cheese board should always include one. To be safe, be sure to include at least one familiar cheese (like an aged cheddar). To avoid overwhelming the palate, serve between three and five cheeses.

Accompany: A good rule here is that opposites attract – an oozing brie loves a crispy cracker, a salty cheese marries best with a sweet fruit paste. Offer a selection of breads: sliced baguette, whole-grain artisan, nut and fruit studded bread and crackers in all shapes and sizes. Fruit is arguably the best accompaniment to cheese – serve with fresh sliced apple, jammy figs, grapes, dried apricots and muscatels, plus honey, preserves or fruit paste (quince is particularly good) and nuts like almonds and walnuts. Items like cornichons, pickles and sundried tomatoes also work for a savoury hit.

Serve: Take your cheeses out of the fridge an hour before serving – the cold neutralises the taste and ruins the creaminess that soft cheeses are renowned for. For visual impact, a well laid cheese board (or platter, or marble slab) should feature cheeses in different shapes and sizes – wheels, wedges and squares. You might like to sit each cheese next to the accompaniment it pairs with, such as blue cheese with honey and aged cheddar with plum paste. It’s ideal to start with the mildest cheese and work up to the strongest, so position them in this sequence on the board. If you have a particularly stinky cheese, separate it from its neighbours (on its own small board or plate) so its pungency doesn’t taint more delicate cheeses served alongside. And always provide two or three cheese knives.

Remember, don’t be scared to try something new. It might smell like an old sock, but give it a try – you might just fall in love!