This Friday, June 4th, is National Cheese Day. Now you’ve probably seen how to pair wine with cheese, and maybe even beer with cheese... but how about pairing cheese with other accoutrements like nuts, berries, and jam? How do you make a killer charcuterie board at home?
For some help with this, we turned to Monger’s Provisions, a cheese, charcuterie, and chocolate specialty store with locations in Midtown Detroit and Ferndale. Head Cheese Monger, Zach Berg, joined Host Tati Amare to share his expertise.
Monger’s Provisions is a store that specializes in cheeses you can’t regularly find at the grocery store. They also have a large selection of specialty chocolate, jams, honeys, meats, and other things to put on your charcuterie board.
“We really love food that has a story behind it. We want to tell you about the people who make it,” said Berg.
The store came about through a love of good food. Berg in particular started his culinary career off at Zingerman’s. Will, his business partner, has been a chocolate lover his whole life so they took their two loves and made a business out of it.
To make a charcuterie board, there are lots of things to consider: How do you want to cut or slice the cheese? Should you leave each cheese in piles or spread it out across the board? Can you add things like chocolate to a board? A lot of it is up to your personal tastes and preferences.
It is, however, a good idea to think of which cheeses pair with which side items and build the board so those are next to each other, almost like a suggestion of what to try together. For example, if you have some salty olives, pair them with soft creamy cheese to balance out the briny flavor. With sweet dried apricots he recommends a saltier cheese like a Manchego or even a cheddar. You can also pair any mild cheese, like brie, with some chocolate.
If you want some extra help, you can get one of their pre-made boxes that comes with all the ingredients, a menu, and a link to a video to show you how to make your own charcuterie board at home. In the video, Berg walks you through a lot of the decisions he makes when creating boards for the store and provides a good framework for you to build off of.
Monger’s Provisions also sells their own charcuterie boards, as well as a cheese “cake” which is literally wheels of cheese stacked on top of each other to appear like a tiered wedding cake. They also offer many fun virtual classes to teach you more about cheese, charcuterie, chocolate, and more.
Monger’s Provisions is located at 4240 Cass Ave UNIT 111 in Midtown Detroit and at The Rust Belt Market in Ferndale.