Hey guys!  Have you ever caught any of my Real Food Fast segments?    This week we’re talking about summer entertaining and life made easy while doing it.  This summer inspired cheese board is simple, but festive and full of amazing bites.  It looks like you spent hours, but it really only takes 15 minutes to pull together.

You can catch the video below, all of my cheese board how-to’s and you will find a link to my berry infused frozen lemonade with the adult version tips and my thoughts on one step that will save you time once your guests arrive.

Any cheese board needs just the right combo of sweet, salty and savory with a bit of crunch in the mix.

What’s on this cheese board?

My Sweets:

Blueberries

Strawberries

Grapes

Blackberries

Raspberries

All fresh and healthy! YUM…

My Salty and my Crunch:

Sesame flatbreads

Mixed nuts

My Savory:

Salami

Roasted pepper bruschetta

The Cheese:

Honey goat cheese

Sharp Cheese

Colby jack

Step 1:  Pick your base.  Mine happens to be a marble cutting board I bought when we first got married and I still love it!  I chose it because it’s large, it’s light and allows the colors I’m using with this cheese board to pop.

Step 2:  Determine what’s going into bowls and place those on your board or right next to it.  They are your base that you will work around.  As you can see, my smaller items went into the bowls that would be challenging to put directly on the board without making a mess; blueberries, blackberries, nuts, raspberries and the bruschetta.

Step 3:  Add your flatbread or other similar items.  I love to using the brand ‘NY Flatbreads’.  they have several kinds, but we love the sesame flavored flatbreads.  No, I’ve not been paid to tell you this!

Step 4: I then add the cheeses and salami.  When using goat cheese, which I LOVE, I always leave it whole and add a cheese knife.  It’s soft an spreadable.  Then I add my sliced cheese and salami.

TIP:  you can purchase pre-sliced cheese and SAVE MORE TIME.

Step 5: Add the garnishing/filler items.  In this case, I’ve used grapes and strawberries.  I simply place them around to fill in the large gaps on the board.

Boom done! Looks GREAT and it’s delish.  It’s the perfect snack tray to stand around and nosh while chatting.

On the video I shared my berry infused frozen lemonade which is perfect all summer long, but also festive for the 4th of July.

Here’s a link to the recipe: Berry Infused Frozen Lemonade

But, before you go…here’s a few thoughts I want to share;

1.  When I entertain, I prep the blackberry and raspberry puree in advance and have them in the fridge ready to pull out to top off the drinks.
2. If you want to make my berry infused frozen lemonade adult friendly here’s the way to do it;

• add 1 ounce of vodka to the honey lemonade
• add 1/2 ounce of blackberry brandy to the blackberry puree
• add 1/2 ounce of raspberry vodka to the raspberry puree
• Follow the rest of the directions in the link.

Happy Summer Y’all…