Goat cheese must be the most controversial cheese. One does like it, another hate. What about you, dear reader? Do you like goat cheese or its odour is too pungent for you?
Whatever you goat cheese stance, I suggest you to try it! May be you will find you earthreal cheese! 🙂
I couldn’t find a good goat cheese, when I lived in Russia, there was no any variety even in supermarkets. You could find the goat milk, which was sold by farmers in the countryside, but usually only milk, they didn’t produce any goat cheese. There were plenty of soft and hard farmer cheeses but made from cow milk. Thus many people haven’t try goat cheese. Of course the situation has changed now.
I was amazed how many goat cheeses are sold in Dubai: fresh, soft and creamy, aged, etc, which are brought here from Europe (usually from France).
Once I watch a food-show and chef made a salad with mini cheese balls, covered with parsley. I liked the idea.. After several days I created my own appetizer to impress my guests.
It looks like a gourmet appetizer, and it’s certainly good if you don’t want to hang around the kitchen for hours. 😉
Mini Appetizer: Goat Cheese Balls
If you want to make it ahead of time, you can roll the balls and roast beetroots 1 to 2 days beforehand.
Ingredients:
150g soft goat cheese (I used honey-flavoured)
1 Tbsp cream cheese
a pinch of sea salt
1/3 tsp white or pink pepper, freshly ground
1-3 Tbsp walnuts, finely chopped
1-3 Tbsp fresh thyme, sage, flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
1-2 small beetroots
1-2 small tomatoes
Dressing:
1 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp wholegrain mustard
1/2 tsp liquid honey
Method:
- Wash and clean beets, cover with a foil and bake in preheated oven 200C/400F for 30-45 minutes, depends on the beets’ size.
- Cut the beets and tomatoes into equal circles, and arrange them on a serving plate.
- In a bowl combine goat and cream cheeses along with salt, pepper and walnuts. Spoon cheese mixture and form into balls (you can use table or teaspoon, depends on a size of your choice).
- Gentle roll the balls in herb mixture, coating well. Place onto vegetables.
- Serve immediately (with fresh arugula or young chard leaves, if desired), or cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.
- Optionally, you can make a dressing and pour over cheese balls and salad.
TIP: You can add 1-2 fresh or dried finely chopped figs into the cheese mixture.
I’m bringing this dish over to FF tonight! Hopefully, someone has brought a good bottle of wine.. 😉 And don’t forget to bring the good mood to the party!
ENJOY!
milkandbun 