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GOURMET NEWS www.gourmetnews.com n JUNE 2016 n GOURMET NEWS 1 0 6 Building the Perfect Charcuterie Board Chips and salsa are great, but maybe it's time to raise the bar and do something a bit more grown-up for your next party. This doesn't mean spending an entire day in the kitchen preparing your mother's handmade raviolis. Instead, we suggest offering an assortment of artisan craft meats, cheeses, crackers, sweet and savory spreads and dried fruits , aka a charcuterie board or tray. Not only are charcuterie boards easy to prepare , they work for every season. Whether a spring brunch, a summer pool party, or the ever-busy winter holidays , they are always a great option for entertaining. Sometimes building a charcuterie board can be a bit intimidating. Where do you start? Columbus makes it easier for you with its Charcuterie Sampler, which provides a variety of four delicious salami : Calabrese, Genoa, Italian Dry and Sopressata. These four styles give diverse flavor profiles that range from a slow mild heat to fresh garlic and even hints of fennel. Both the Italian Dry and Sopressata are a thicker cut, creating a mouth-feel akin to a hand-cut slice (without the work!). All you need to do is add some accompaniments . The key is variety and bal- ance with a focus on foods that complement each other without overwhelming the palate. Calabrese is a zesty salame made with red bell peppers. Enjoy it with a hard cheese like Parmigiano Reggiano. Wash it down with an IPA or a Syrah. Genoa is a mild salame seasoned with wine and garlic. Add a softer cheese, like fontina or fresh goat cheese for a different texture. They go well with a chilled Sauvi- gnon Blanc or Pilsner. Italian Dry is the com- pany's San Francisco classic salame that pairs well with a hard sheep-milk cheese like pecorino romano. This com- bination works well with Pinot Noirs, Pilsners and Pale Ales. Sopressata brings flavors of sweet fennel and chili pepper. Combine with a harder cow cheese like grana padano. Savor it with a glass of Pinot Grigio. You can also include other delicious cured meats like prosciutto or coppa to your board. Here are some other suggestions for your mouth-watering charcuterie platter: Crunchy breads and crackers: These should be plain so as not to compete for the many flavors on the board. Favorites: Toasted plain baguette, pita bread, water crackers and bread sticks. Spreads: Both creamy and seeded mustard versions are good choices. Sweet and sa- vory jams with caramelized onion fla- vors or deep fruity notes are also welcome part- ners. Be sure to select flavors that aren't over- whelming. Favorites: Fruit chutney, fig jam, hummus or a white bean dip. Olives and pickled vegetables: Always great additions. Cornichons and pickled radishes work very well. Fresh seasonal fruits are welcome too. In the winter, dried fruits including apricots and figs are great complements. That's it! Just start with the best craft meats, include complementary cheese, breads and spreads that provide different tex- tures and flavors, pop open bottles of wine and beer, and enjoy the gathering. Principe Delivers True Italian Tradition Founded in 1945, Principe is now a third generation, family owned Italian company, with more than 70 years of tradition, experi- ence and unique know-how. The company, famous for its innate ability to always move forward and constantly innovate while main- taining sacred respect for tradition, has quite an interesting history. After losing everything in WWII, the Dukcevich family was forced to flee its native home of Croatia and take refuge in Trieste, a multi-cultural port city in Northeastern Italy. This area, in the region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, is located on the Aus- tro-Hungarian border and is enveloped by the Alps. Noticing the unique culture and eating habits of their new home city, the Dukcevich family began producing and sell- ing traditional recipe frankfurters and cooked and roasted hams to the locals, and the rest, as they say, is history! But they didn't stop there. Today Principe is a leading top quality producer of one of Italy's most prestigious delicacies, Prosciutto di San Daniele! Principe's ever-growing portfolio of prod- ucts includes various agings of Prosciutto di San Daniele, Prosciutto di Parma and Pro- sciutto Italiano; an ample selection of arti- sanal cooked and roasted hams, and many other authentic regional Italian deli meats. Principe not only imposes higher restrictive standards on its products than most regula- tory boards do, but also demands direct con- trol over every step in the production process, from the development of free range natural farms to in-house de-boning and cur- ing. This meticulous quest for perfection and constant innovation allows for dependable, consistent, top quality products and an exclusive completely closed food safety system. And with proprietary ani- mal farms, five production plants, two slicing facilities and export to more than 40 countries around the world, Principe has cer- tainly become one of Italy's industry leaders for premium deli meats. In 2016, Principe Foods announced a spe- cial collaboration in the U.S. with the Ventre family to introduce a new portfolio of do- mestically produced salumi. The Ventre family has generations of experience mak- ing salumi, from its laborious roots in Southern Italy to the streets of Brooklyn, working with family and friends in the pork industry. They grew up making traditional Italian-American recipes and transformed their style to include also re- gional Italian, global and modern fusion techniques and flavors. Just like the Principe family, they too are pioneers and leaders in their fields; the fit was natural! The new domestic Principe line will be completely certified Antibiotic Free and will complement the imported Italian Principe line with a vast selection of U.S. made, top quality salami, hams, fresh sausages and unique specialty items; avail- able in convenient pre-sliced retail and food- service formats as well. For more information, call 310.680.5500, email info@principefoodusa.com or go to www.principefoodusa.com. Chef Shamy: Gourmet Butters & Frostings Chef Shamy develops and produces gourmet butters and frostings from its 20,000-square- foot facility in Salt Lake City. Its products include Parmesan Basil Garlic Butter, Honey Butters in Vanilla, Cinnamon and Passion Fruit flavors, Sauté Butter in Lemon Dill, Garlic Herb and Southwest- ern. It also offers French Onion Butter with Asiago Cheese. The latest offering is buttercream frosting in vanilla and chocolate. All fla- vors are all-natural, made with real butter and have no additives or fillers. "There really isn't any competition," Shamy says. "We produce a great product and people instantly taste the difference from the oil based knock-offs. Other offerings in this category all contain Soybean, Canola or Palm oil." Stores and bakeries that are ahead of the curve will offer real garlic butter on their Take and Bake French bread and real butter- cream frosting on their cakes. Consumers will pay more for high quality or healthier al- ternatives. Shamy butters offer both. Flavored butters are still a new category in the U.S. It makes sense for retailers to have multiple offerings in the dairy. Consumers won't buy two different butters or two dif- ferent margarines out of the dairy. They might buy one and then a garlic butter or a honey butter, so Chef Shamy butters and frostings are an added profit center for the dairy set. Chef Shamy gourmet butters can be found in Costco Northwest, LA., and Costco Korea as well as some Walmart's, Sam's Road Shows and many other gro- cery retailers across the U.S. Several U.S. groceries which have caught the vi- sion of real butter feature Chef Shamy Garlic Butter, Sauté Butter and Frosting in their backend operations and their Take and Bake pro- grams. Shamy says, "Our best seller is garlic but- ter with parmesan and basil. An email from a woman outside Tucson said she had bought 12 tubs of it at a roadshow and she had run out and had written in a panic to find more. Once people have tasted it or cooked with it, they can't live without it. One teary eyed mother called our office to thank us. Her children had become anemic from an unwill- ingness to eat anything. She said, 'my kids will eat anything I put your butters on and their health has improved.' The comments on our Facebook page keep us motivated to get it in every store." "We want to expand our reach to more re- tailers," Shamy says. "There are so many customers nationwide and some interna- tional customers waiting to get our butter at a retailer near them." The most common question to the Chef Shamy receptionist is, "Why don't you guys go on Shark Tank?" Shamy's answer: "We have been invited, maybe someday we will."