July 4th Holiday Entertaining

We are headed to the mountains for the holiday next week. Even though the cabin is comfortable, it doesn’t have all the dishes or entertaining items I have here at Bella Terra.

Therefore, I need to plan ahead and determine what I can work with. What’s so nice about mountain life is that it is less formal and entertaining is often spontaneous.

Today I experimented with a patriotic cheese board. We tend to have most of these items in our refrigerator so throwing it together doesn’t require a lot of planning or work.

Start with any large platter or cutting board. My family bought these beautiful handmade wooden boards for my birthday a few years back and I just love them. They are too pretty to cut on so I generally use them to display appetizers.

I like a combination of meat, cheese, fruits, vegetables, nuts, olives, pickles and various crackers.

Any kind of salami or prosciutto is an easy add. It’s all in the presentation so I will neatly stack or roll the meat.

The vegetables can be made attractive by slicing them in various ways. Here I have strategically cut off the cucumber peel, which provides a nice look to the edge.

I liked this idea so much for the holidays that I borrowed it from Amanda Gluck from Fashionable Hostess~~simply cutting some of the cheese into star shapes. I ordered the cutters from Amazon and now have more star shape cutters than I need!

I would suggest using either a thickly sliced cheese. Pre-cut cheese slices are a bit too thin.

The board has a combination of white cheddar, yellow cheddar and goat cheese. Tomatoes are from the garden. Red strawberries and blueberries add a bit of flag colors.

Be creative and use what you have~~cheese sticks or breadsticks would add some height; nuts fill in the empty spots too!

What will you be serving for the July 4th holiday?