Simple, Beautiful Cheeseboard to serve at Your Holiday Party

Ah the cheeseboard! A cheese lovers paradise and the number one spot your friends and guests will congregate around when you offer up a fabulous board. Here are my tips on creating a cheeseboard for your next holiday party. 

The key to a cheeseboard is balance and creativity. To create an interesting board that will have something for everyone, choose a variety of textures and flavors, such as a cows milk cheese, goats milk and blue. Ideally, you’ll serve a mild, medium, strong and maybe a funky, pungent chese. 

For texture, choose one to two hard cheeses like an aged cheddar or Midnight Moon which is goats-milk based, a semi-hard cheese like a French Comté or Italian Stelvio, and a creamy cheese like a Cambozola or triple cream brie. If you’re a cheese nerd or just down to get experimental and try something new, there are plenty of cheeses that are flavored with herbs, truffles, nuts, even red wine. 

Offer a variety of crackers, rustic bread and breadsticks. My favorites are Okina Biscuits Fromage de Brebis made with chili peppers, 365 Wasabi Rice Crackers, and thinly sliced pieces of French baguette. Fresh cut fruit like pear and apple are excellent accompaniments to cheese and can be sliced thin as another base option.

Fruit garnishes are an easy way to add a pop of color and a good rule of thumb is to stay seasonal. So for winter opt for in-season fruits like pomegranate, persimmons, kumquats and berries. I like to break open the pomegranate and let it rest on the board for a rustic touch. 

Other tasty treats that are perfect accompaniments to any cheese board are meats, dried fruits like apricots and cherries, roasted and salted nuts (TJ's makes a delicious package of Rosemary Truffle Marcona almonds), cornishons, olives and little bowls of specialty jams, jellies and honey. There are so many options, you can literally have a completely different cheese board every time you assemble one. 

For a festive touch, I dressed the outside of the board with some evergreen branches and artichokes. You can do this with other whole fruits and vegetables that are in season, like fresh pears or even some winter gourds. 

You can arrange the board about 30 minutes before guests arrive so that it has some time to soften. As cheese reaches room temperature, the flavors get stronger. Just pile all the crackers, fruits and accompaniments around the cheeses, it’s that simple. Pair with some wine and enjoy your company.