A good board is less about shopping and more about how you put it down. Our counter team builds them every day for the deli table, and the rules are simple: give everything a place, keep the colours mixed and never let a gap show. Here is how we do it at home, with the cheeses and jars we always reach for.
Serves: 6. Takes: 20 minutes.
What you need
- three cheeses: something hard like a mature cheddar, something soft like a ripe brie and something blue
- a box of rosemary and sea salt crackers
- a jar of fig and walnut chutney
- a jar of raw wildflower honey
- a bag of oak smoked almonds
- a bag of hand-cooked sea salt crisps
- cured meats, or calabrian nduja spread on toast for the brave
- grapes, figs or sliced pears
- a small bowl of olives dressed in Coratina extra virgin olive oil
Method
- Take the cheeses out of the fridge an hour before you plan to eat, so they come up to room temperature and taste of themselves again.
- Place the cheeses first, spread well apart, each with its own knife, then build the rest of the board around them.
- Add small bowls for the chutney, honey and olives, and tuck the cured meats between the cheeses in loose folds rather than flat slices.
- Fan the crackers in two or three places across the board, breaking up the lines and giving everyone a way in.
- Fill every gap with fruit, almonds and crisps until no wood shows through, then finish with a drizzle of honey over the blue cheese and a crack of black pepper.
Our counter rules
Odd numbers look more generous than even ones, so buy three cheeses rather than two or four, and five grapes rather than a neat bunch. Every cheese deserves its own knife, partly for flavour and partly so nobody has to ask. Put something sweet next to something salty, and something crunchy next to something soft, so each bite has a little contrast. Leave the strongest cheese until last, and always put the board somewhere people are standing, not sitting.
How much to buy
As a rough guide, allow about 50g of cheese per person for a starter or a drinks table, and closer to 100g each if the board is the meal. Add two or three crackers per person and you will not run short. For six people we would buy three cheeses of around 150g each, a jar of chutney, a bag of almonds and a bag of crisps, then let the fruit do the rest. Anything left over makes an excellent lunch the next day.
