Gap Creek Gourmet joined GALS Greenville on Monday night for a beer and cheese tasting. I've been on this all girl beer lovers group invite list for a while and finally buckled down, grabbed my buddy Nina, and got my butt out there to meet the ladies.
Okay, I'm going to name drop now: I am such a crazy fangirl so it was so cool to meet Christina, the other half of the Upstate Under Your Nose blog team (love their blog!) and Faith, the wife of former Owl Restaurant Chef de Cuisine, Joey Fazio (He's now at Cliff's Valley in Travelers Rest, in case you wondered). And local musician Darby Wilcox was there (OMG! Love her.). Michele Golobic-Moore, the new owner of Independent Public Ale House, was there and I even ran into an old friend from Travelers Rest high school. And I met so many more creative, fun women at the event. It was as a total blast!
Here's how it worked: everyone brought a beer and cheese pairing to share with the class, then we grazed around the room, mingled, and at the end of the night voted on our favorite pairing. The winner took home this fall brew.
You guys know I'm so not a beer drinker. I'm a wine girl. So this was a full on education for me. I went to the guys at Community Tap for a little help on the beer and cheese pairing. They recommended a Saison Dupont Belgian Farmhouse Ale with an aged Manchego. I didn't love the beer, but I could have eaten that cheese all day long. Here were some of my other favorite pairings. (Due to heavy sipping, I was a little lax about snapping pics of the names of cheeses.) The Fox Barrel Pear Cider was awesome. I loved the Chocolaty Westbrook, and I have go to get my hands on another Lips of Faith Plout. (There ARE beers in the world I like. Yea me!)
This girl gets mad props for presentation. She whipped up these fantastic little bits of heaven: Kerrygold Reserve Cheddar with Lemon Curd on Ginger Snaps. Oh, boy. You HAVE to try it. You'll be the hit of your next party. (And I MUST get one of those t-shirts. Who doesn't love a club with swag?!)
Drum roll.... my favorite tasty nibble from the party was this Pimento Cheese. Seriously, the best pimento cheese I have ever put in my face. I had to have the recipe and Stephanie Smutler was more than happy to share her recipe with me and with you guys! I can't wait to whip up my own batch of Smutty's Pimento Cheese.
Smutty's Pimento Cheese
1 8 oz. container of cream cheese
2-3 tbsps mayo (Duke's of course)
1 jalapeno finely chopped
less than a 1/4 of an onion finely chopped
1-2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1-2 blocks of shredded cheddar, you could use one white and one yellow, which is what gives it that color.
1 jar of pimentos (smashed before adding them)
a little paprika, cayenne, salt and pepper to taste
Blend. Serve.
Cheers, y'all. And GALS Greenville, thanks for having me!
1 comment:
I'm a pimento cheese fiend, and that looks heavenly. I recently created my own recipe with a mesh of Soby's pimento cheese recipe and another recipe from an SC blogger. Even my husband likes it, but I use the Seriously Sharp Cabot cheese (yellow and white), and he LOVES that. I would love to try making the one you've got here, but I'm afraid he wouldn't touch it with the onion. He's pickier than a child when it comes to food!
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