Fwd: Chowhounds Wine & Cheese Tasting, response from WF

[Joel Cure]

Please check this out and give me some feedback...Thanks.

J,

I’m going to let you set this up through Andrea Holder, our Catering specialist. Since this would be a “paid” event, she’s going to be the best person to pull it all together. A couple of things we’ll need to know:

·         Where would you like to do this in the store? Would the café area near the customer restrooms be okay?

·         How many cheese would you like to sample?

·         Do you want this to be a true tasting, or to be more like a meal?

·         Do you want to pair wines with this? If not, what would you like to have available to drink?

·         How many people are you anticipating?

·         What style seating do you want? Family style, where you’re all at one big table? Or theatre style, where you’d all be facing forward and would balance plates, etc. on your laps?

·         How long would you like this to last?

·         Do you want it to be a passive thing where y’all kind of lead yourselves and w just set it up? Or would you rather there be a beginning, middle and end, where we bring in a cheese monger to go through the cheeses, etc.?

 

Please reply all to this email so all parties involved have a better idea of what you’re thinking so we can better gauge whether or not we can accommodate you.

 

Thanks,

 

Laura Brooks Bright Marketing Team Leader Whole Foods Market – Mountain Brook, AL 3100 Cahaba Village Plaza Birmingham, AL 35243 Ring. (205) 912-8400 Fax. (205) 912-8411 Surf. wholefoods.com/birmingham Tweet. twitter.com/wholefoodsbham Facebook. facebook.com/wholefoodsbirmingham Cellar Stock. http://cellarstock.wholefoodsrsvp.com

 

 

[Jannae]

J- here's my 2 cents, and a question:

· Where would you like to do this in the store? Would the café

area
near the customer restrooms be okay?

I guess this would be the best place. Never really paid attention to
the cafe area to be honest.

· How many cheese would you like to sample?

Again, I'm leaving the selection up to you and BD, since you have such
a good plan already in mind.

· Do you want this to be a true tasting, or to be more like a
meal?

Tasting is fine by us - though I wonder what they mean "more like a
meal"?

· Do you want to pair wines with this? If not, what would you

like
to have available to drink?

We would be open to sampling some wines, however, we're also good with
water, tea, or some kind of soda.

· How many people are you anticipating?

The recap on the other thread looks like 7 with Dax + 1 as tentative.

· What style seating do you want? Family style, where you’re

all at
one big table?

Family style I think may be best?

· How long would you like this to last?

I'm guessing, what? An hour to an hour and a half? Longer?

· Do you want it to be a passive thing where y’all kind of

lead
yourselves and w just set it up? Or would you rather there be a
beginning,
middle and end, where we bring in a cheese monger to go through the
cheeses,
etc.?

I guess my main concern would be: does the price go up if we have
their cheese monger there to guide the presentation of the cheeses? It
may be worth it to have that presence, if the price isn't exhorbitant.

[Big Daddy]

I think the cafe area near the bathrooms would be the best spot, with
seating set up so we all can discuss what we're sampling -- and if
the
cheesemonger is leading this, so it's easiest for that person to
address us. In other words, we don't need a long table if we get as
many as the Chen gathering, but we'd need some kind of head table
(for
the cheeses and discussion leader) if we the group size is more like
the Silver Coin event.

True tasting versus a meal: Tasting, obviously, although I suspect it
would have the effect of being a meal for many of us. One thing WF
did
for the Swine and Wine was put out a variety of breads and spreads.
That might work, although I think we want the focus to be on the
cheese. We always could supplement afterward with their prepared
foods. Another thing to consider is if we want to set up a
charcuterie
sampler, as well. They have some very good cured meats from artisan
producers.

As for the number of cheeses we want to sample: it would depend on
the
number of participants. If we were doing this at a private residence,
I would recommend each person bring about 1/3 lb. of 3-4 cheeses. It
would be worth asking people what their goal is here: a basic
education into different styles/types of cheese or something more in-
depth.

For the former, I think we'd want to sample 3 or so variations of
different cheese types (hard, bleu, semi-hard, semi-soft, bloom rind,
washed rind, triple cream, goat, sheep or combinations of some of
those. For the latter, perhaps we'd do a horizontal tasting of
different "brands" of the same type of cheese (like the gouda and
cheddar comparisons I recommended earlier), we also probably want 3-4
of each.

I don't think pairing wines would work, since we tend to have
different drinking preferences. I'm sure they would allow us to
purchase what we want to consume in-store. Maybe they could provide
recommendations of wines or beers based on the cheeses we'll be
trying.

As for active versus passive: we'd all learn more if we had someone
leading this -- like the WF cheesemonger/manager. One or more of us
Hounds with some knowledge of cheese could lead as well. So I vote
active.

You've got the tentative head count. If we're set on April 15 (what
time?; I suggest 6ish), you should put a new item in Chowhound
announcing Birmingham Chowdown IV and referring people to the Google
group. I've got a couple at work who tentatively are interested and I
urged them to sign up for the Google group and make their RSVP.

Finally, we should have some kind of individual sheets for recording
our impressions of individual cheeses, what kinds/brands we liked and
disliked, what we want to try again. This would be something they can
take home.
Someone also should have a means of creating a composite of our
impressions, which would be posted on Chowdown and the Google group
for the cheesedown.

[Joel Cure]

Here's a "Cheese Tasting Notes" page that I whipped up. If you like it, you can print it out for use at the cheese tasting. If you have suggestions for revision, let me know and I'll change it.

Thanks.

[Dax]

Yes wine,

maybe 1.5 hours tops,

tasting vs meal,

yes on monger,

at 6 PM on that section of 280, it is a parking lot.

>  Cheese Tasting Notes.pdf
> 99KViewDownload

[Joel Cure]

Well, the time is negotiable....how about 6:30?

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to birmingham-chowhounds+unsubscribegooglegroups.com or reply to this email with the words "REMOVE ME" as the subject.

[Big Daddy]

That stretch of U.S. 280 is more manageable after 6 p.m., so 6:30
would work for me.

> > ME" as the subject.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Joel Cure]

Let's plan to do it at 6:30 then.

On Mar 27, 2010 3:54 PM, "Big Daddy" <bru...@bellsouth.net> wrote:

That stretch of U.S. 280 is more manageable after 6 p.m., so 6:30
would work for me.

On Mar 26, 10:52 am, Joel Cure <joelc...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Well, the time is negotiable....how ab...

> On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 10:33 AM, Dax <dax...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Yes wine,
>

> > maybe 1.5 hour...

> > ME" as the subject.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to birmingham-chowhounds+unsubscribegooglegroups.com or ...

[Jannae]

Love the PDF you put together Joel. Hope there are a lot more of OMG
and very few YUK ratings!

On Mar 27, 10:45 pm, Joel Cure <joelc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Let's plan to do it at 6:30 then.
>

[curej]

Most recent WF response:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "April Moate" <April.Mo...@wholefoods.com>
Date: Mar 28, 2010 2:27 PM
Subject: Specialty Department Tasting
To: "joelc...@gmail.com" <joelc...@gmail.com>

Joel-

Below I've listed a few suggestions for cheese tasting themes. I
would
recommend choosing one or two categories at the most. I would also
recommend doing no more than 8 cheeses total. I discussed it with
Randall
and we both think you should consider letting us do at least a few
wine or
beer pairings with the cheeses. Not that you don't have some savvy
folks in
your group but without some planning you could end up with a pairing
disaster!

*Possible themes:*

Herve Mons - examples: Persille de Malzieu, Persille de Beaujolais,
Camembert, Pyrennes Brebis, Gabietou, Blue de Casses, Cazelle de St
Affrique

American Artisanal - examples: Roth Kase Private Reserve, Cabot
Clothbound
Cheddar, Landaff, Meadow Creek (Grayson, Mountaineer, Appalachian),
Capriole
(Obannon, Wabash Cannonball), Wright's Dairy (Wanda, Canebrake Gouda)

Across the Pond - examples: Kerrygold (Black Wax Cheddar, Ivernia,
Dubliner
with Irish Stout), Neal's Yard Dairy (Strathdon Blue, Cornish Yarg,
Cheshire, Colston Bassett Stilton), Borough Market Cheddar

Different takes on the same style - examples: Soft ripened, blue,
sheep/goat, firm cow, washed rind

This last one is the most open-ended suggestion but I would still
limit the
number of cheeses you try to taste at one time.

Some of the specific cheeses I listed may not be available at that
time but
that's why I gave several examples. We just never know what is going
to
come in when we order it.

Let me know what you think!

April Moate
Associate Team leader
Specialty Department
WFM-Mountain Brook
april.mo...@wholefoods.com
205-912-8400