How to Make the Perfect Mother’s Day Cheese Board

Editor’s note: Cheese is perfect to share on Mother’s Day since milk symbolizes motherhood. For Mother’s Day, we pay extra homage to mothers and lactating goats, sheep, cows and buffalo, because cheese literally wouldn’t exist without them.

The perfect Mother’s Day cheese board is a bit of a misnomer, because there are an endless number of perfect Mother’s Day cheese board possibilities. The ideal Mother’s Day cheese experience is one you share with the moms in your life, preferably with some sunshine and a lot of joy.

On my second Mother’s Day as a mom, and my second pandemic Mother’s Day, I’m doing some reflecting. (It still feels surreal sometimes, that I am somebody’s mother!) Mother’s Day can be painful for so many. I think of my mom, who lost her mother just a handful of weeks before I was born. I think of the miscarriage I had before getting pregnant with my daughter, and all the people who long to be moms. Of those who lost their moms, or whose moms are not in their lives.

In those hazy newborn days, I remember endlessly bouncing my baby on a yoga ball sometime in the middle of the night, the fluffy down of her hair under my chin, her tears comingling with my own, the immense physical ache of my exhaustion, thinking how beautiful, how crazy that this is what we do for each other.

I think of all the ways we need mothering, even if that doesn’t come from a mom, per se, and all the imperfect and gigantic care we give and receive. One of the reasons I’ve always loved cheese is that it brings people together, that it’s a vehicle for delight.

The world blossoms in springtime. New York is at the height of its glory. Pear trees and cherry blossoms, Prospect Park full of optimistic flip-flop wearers and sun worshippers, tulips everywhere, a hop in everyone’s step, and definitely in mine. (I’ve also just had my second vaccine and feel hopeful for the first time in a long while.) Out in the cheesemaking world, the pastures return to their most verdant splendor. Farm animals leave the barn after a long winter of confinement to graze upon fresh, first-grown grasses. Happy goats and the freshest grass and herbs make for spectacular cheeses. While many farmers milk their herd all year long, dairy goats breed and freshen more seasonally than cows. Come spring, they’re producing gorgeous milk.

Those hearty, bold cheeses that age for months will be waiting for you in autumn. Spring is the season for young, fresh goat goodness. Here are two unexpected kinds of goat cheese that make my quintessential Mother’s Day cheese lineup. The first, Cabra al Gofio from the Canary Islands, is not super young, but it still tastes of spring. It’s made using a traditional method of coating the rind in toasted corn flour (gofio) with Majorero goat’s milk from local farmers on the island of Fuerteventura. The corn flour gives the cheese a wonderfully subtly sweet flavor, with hints of roasted cornmeal. It’s a crowd-pleaser, perfect for sharing with the whole family.

The second pick is Nocetto di Capra, a soft-ripened goat cheese from the affineurs at Arnoldi in Piemonte, Italy. Made with milk from Saanen goats, indigenous to Bergamo, this pretty, bloomy round is velvety, mild, fresh, and absolutely luscious. Nocetto di Capra is a great pick for Brie-lovers looking to branch out.

Serve these with rhododendron honey from Mitica, which has a wonderful richness and an earthy, lingering finish that is a great foil to the tang of these goat cheeses. Add some shards of sbrisolona (or consider making one from this sbrisolono recipe), a traditional baked almond cookie from Mantova, Italy. It is satisfyingly crunchy, crumbly, and nutty, thanks to cornmeal and almonds. I’ll be adding a glass of rosé Champagne, too.

Here’s to the renewal of spring, to the moms in our lives, to the unspeakable lengths they go to take good care of us. May we all extend serious care and love to each other and enjoy some exceptional cheese.

Pairings, Holidays, Goat CheeseHannah HowardMay 5, 2021