Cheese and wine parties are very grown up, which means that many people think they are daunting. The truth is that cheese and wine parties are a lot of fun, not to mention extremely tasty. Hosting a party is not all that difficult, provided you remember a few essential tips.
Choose your cheese
There are five basic types of cheese:
1) Soft cheese, like feta, brie, camembert and goats’ cheese.
2) Hard cheese, like Edam, gruyere, Parmesan and Emmentaler.
3) Semi-soft cheese, like baby Swiss, Colby and fortina.
4) Semi-hard cheese, like cheddar, Gouda and provolone.
5) Stinky cheese (some people prefer the term pungent), like stilton, gorgonzola, blue cheese and Roquefort.
(Stinky cheese, has been given its own category here, but it can also be categorised as hard, soft, semi-hard and semi-soft.)
Display your cheese
Proper cheese displays look pretty but they also prevent contamination, so your Edam doesn’t taste like Danish blue. You can have a cheese platter for every type or be really fancy and have a mini platter for every cheese.
Don’t just bung your cheese on the board and consider your job done. Decorate it with some appropriate accompaniments, like grapes, fig preserve, honey and crackers and different types of bread. Label every cheese so people know what they are eating – a toothpick with an ensign will do nicely.
Have at least one cheese knife per cheese, also to avoid contamination.
Add wine
Many people find this the most daunting part, especially if they’re not wine connoisseurs. Askmen.com, which is a surprisingly informative source, says that there are generic pairings that you can fall back on and many wines go well with several types of cheese.
For instance, Chenin blanc, Cabernet, Chianti and Bordeaux go well with soft cheese. Pinot noir, Cabernet, Sauvignon blanc, Chardonnay and Sherry go well with hard cheese. Champagne, Chardonnay, Bordeaux and Riesling go well with semi-soft cheese. Tawny port, Cabernet, Riesling, Chenin blanc and Chianti Riserva go well with semi-hard cheese. Pungent cheeses go well with sweet wines.
There is nothing wrong with being multi-cultural but, but a common trend is to use only wines from a particular country.
Cheese is the theme
This sounds rather obvious but consider whether you only want to serve slices of cheese with accompaniments and bread or whether you want to add some other snacks. A great idea is to have a cheese fondue on the go for guests to dip into whenever they feel like it. You can go classic with Gruyere and Emmentaler or mix it up with a roasted pepper goat cheese fondue or a brie and pesto fondue.
Cheesy breads, cheesy veg and cheesy meats are also an option. Avoid cheesy pastas though, as they are remarkably filling. Cheesecake is, of course, the only dessert.
Bonus tips
Never run out of cheese, but don’t buy so much that you’ll be eating leftovers for weeks afterwards (unless this is your intention). Common consensus has it that you should plan for 4oz or 100g of cheese per person.
Serve cheese at room temperature and not chilled. Grapes, pear, plums, figs and nectarines work well with cheese, so do very dark chocolate, honey and fruit chutneys.
Nuts, especially walnuts, pine nuts, hazels and Brazils also go with cheese and wine evenings.
Sandy Cosser
