1 Topic by William (edited by William 2022-12-03 15:49:36)

  • Registered: 2022-01-21
  • Posts: 1,527

Topic: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

I know this is silly. smile

I have had a non-personal email from Tesco.

It is largely about food for Christmas festivities.

One section is Keep everyone sweet with a DIY dessert board

Mention of "board" in relation to food reminded me of that years ago, on the few occasions I dined in a restaurant where each course had a choice of two or three, for the final part, one that seemed to always be included was "Selection from the cheese board".

I never chose that, I usually had something like a piece of lemon meringue pie, or apricot mousse, that sort of thing, but I do remember seeing the cheese board on a trolley being taken to other tables. smile

Sort of a wooden board, perhaps an inch thick, with about six big lumps of cheese on it, unwrapped, sort of a yellow one, a red one, and an off-white one with lots of blue lines in it.

I wonder if the cheeses got replaced regularly or if they just sat there for months until they got used up.

I don't know why I find it funny, but I do.

I appreciate that some readers might find recognition humour in this, but that some people might well not.

I put "et cetera" in the title of the thread in case anyone has any anecdotes about food in retaurants and hotels that may amuse at least some of us.

William

2 Reply by jackneve (edited by jackneve 2022-12-03 16:45:00)

  • Registered: 2022-01-21
  • Posts: 382

Re: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

Cheese in a restaurant is served as several bits and is on a board because normally a portion of a chosen block is cut for serving.  A wooden board will not blunt the knife, which for cheese, usually has to go right down to the surface. A ceramic plate will eventually spoil the knife, and its dish shape makes it difficult to cut right down to the surface.

I am not sure what is intrinsically humorous about bits of cheese sitting on the board. Whether they were replaced due to age spoiling before being used up by serving depends on the restauranteur.

The expectation of a cheese board depends partly on ones upbringing, I guess.  I have been abroad very many times on business, and while it is not so in all countries, in France the offer of cheese is common. BTW, they eat it after the main course, le plat, and before the dessert - to finish the wine taken with the starter, l'entrée.

I suspect that you, William, do not usually eat cheese with a main meal, and the idea of bits of differently coloured cheese sitting on a board  is somehow funny. Me, I find the idea mouthwatering. I especially like, as they are available round here, Brie, Munster, Camembert, Port Salut, which are white. I love blue cheeses, Stilton, and St Agur from the Auvergne. Good yellow well-matured English Cheddar, for me is for breakfast. The available English Cheddars don't taste the same as the New Zealand Cheddars.

An anecdote about cheese? Well, last evening, I had opened a rather well ripe Brie. I had cut the end off the wedge, and had to perch the wedge on the rim of a Munster cardboard disc pack. After a while, the very soft cheese wa s_l_o_w_l_y oozing out of its sleeve. It reminded me of the experiment, I believe is in Australia, where a funnel full of pitch is slowly dripping, a drop taking many decades. It seems the last time a drop fell, it during the night, and sadly no-one saw it happen.

  • Registered: 2022-01-21
  • Posts: 1,527

Re: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

In the days before I was a vegan I did sometimes eat cheese, though rarely and not for some years before becoming vegan, as I had found that I did not like cheese and it seemed not to like me. It was very fatty, seemed to get caught up in my teeth and I found it sickly. When I had eaten cheese it was never just on its own, I always had it in a sandwich or a bread roll.

Over the years I had tried, sort of once or twice each, Port Salut, Emmental, Gouda, Brie, Lymeswold.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lymeswold_cheese

I remember a television news item about Lymeswold cheese when it was introduced. There was a man promoting it and the interviewer asked him about the name and he said it was to be like the name of a typical southern English village, though for copyright reasons it was not the name of an actual real village. The interviewer seemed unable or unwilling to accept this and persisted in saying that the name of a real village would be better while the man promoting the cheese kept trying to explain about the copyright issue and the need to have a specially coined name like an English village but not an actual English village.

I know that now there are vegan cheeses and soya substitutes for cream, but I avoid anything that is not low fat, so I have not tried them. I would have quite liked to have tried the soya substitute for the cream, but I thought better of it and did not. However, I have never fancied trying the vegan cheese.

I don't know why I find the bit about Selection from the cheese board on a menu funny now. I didn't back then, it was just an option that I never chose.

Maybe one time the trolley rattled as it was pushed along and people looked up and at the trolley and people at various tables smiled at each other for a moment before all becoming private groups again.

William

  • Registered: 2022-01-21
  • Posts: 1,527

Re: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

Truncated Brie wedge
Time proceeds on its journey
The rheology

William

  • Registered: 2022-01-21
  • Posts: 1,527

Re: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

I suppose that for a connoisseur of fine cheeses and a restaurant making a good effort, then Selection from the cheese board would be a great delight.

How does it work in practice please?

Suppose that the menu has for dessert a choice of Lemon Meringue Pie, Apricot Mousse, Selection from the cheese board, and the diner chooses Selection from the cheese board.

Does the customer get to choose?

For example, is it one cheese in a portion size decided by the waiter, or can the diner have several pieces of good size?

Does Selection from the cheese board mean in practice that things such as bread, butter, crackers and so on are supplied too, or is it just a piece of cheese on its own?

Does it get placed on a plate?

These days, do they do a vegan cheese option and, if so, is it on a different board to avoid cross-contamination with non-vegan cheese?

And whatever information about how it is all done would be interesting please.

William

6 Reply by GB

  • GB
  • GB
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2022-01-22
  • Posts: 338

Re: Selection from the cheese board et cetera

The available English Cheddars don't taste the same as the New Zealand Cheddars

Perhaps you should try regular American Cheddar. It don't taste. Although if you go for Extra Sharp it is approaching average English Cheddar.

I vote British Isles cheeses as best in the world. I've never felt the need of, or taste for, "foreign" cheese. Stilton, Farmhouse Cheddar, Caerphilly, Derbyshire etc. What more could anyone want?