Food & Drink

One of Seattle’s Top Cheesemongers is Throwing a Fancy Cheese Pop-Up at a Ballard Restaurant

Veteran cheese guru Alison Leber hits Brimmer and Heeltap with high-end holiday cheeses.

By Chelsea Lin December 20, 2017

roving-cheese-shop-pic-edit

You probably already have plans for Saturday—but you’ll want to make time to swing by Ballard’s Brimmer and Heeltap between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. for one amazing pop-up cheese shop.

The Roving Cheese Shop is the passion project of Alison Leber, who longtime Seattleites may remember from her Brie and Bordeaux bistro/cheese-and-wine shop that she sold in 2000 after the birth of her second child. Well, that kiddo is now a teenager and Leber’s now got a successful consulting business working with restaurants on various aspects of the food industry (clients include the likes of Beecher’s and Gnocchi Bar).

Still, she says she really, really loves cheese—teaching classes about it, giving recommendations about it to friends, selling it to strangers. She’s been teaching classes at the likes of the Pantry, but in October, Leber launched the Roving Cheese Shop as a way to get back in touch with customers.

The Dec. 23 pop-up will be the first at Brimmer and Heeltap; she’s done others at Heirloom Cookshop in Snoqualmie and the Feed Store in Mt. Baker. She’s planning to bring a dozen or so cheeses she calls holiday favorites. A few of the things she’s most excited about: Shropshire Blue from England; Epoisses Marc de Bourgougne from France (unless it sells out at the Feed Store on Thursday night, she says); Springbrook Farm Tarentaise from Vermont; Ossau Iraty Black Head Manech from the Pyrenees (“a nutty, velvety cheese made solely from the Black Head Manech sheep—very cool stuff,” she says). Brimmer and Heeltap owner Jen Doak says they’ll have a curated selection of wines to sell as well.

Leber says she’s planning to keep the pop-up fairly small scale, and has no interest in opening another brick and mortar. (Worth reading: this post from former Calf and Kid owner-cheesemonger Sheri LaVigne on seeing her business fail.) Keep an eye on Facebook for dates to come in 2018.

 

Follow Us

Seattle Restaurant Week Starts Sunday

Seattle Restaurant Week Starts Sunday

Get some great deals while supporting favorite establishments

For two weeks, you can eat your heart out in Seattle and surrounding neighborhoods during Seattle Restaurant Week. From April 14-27, prepare for exclusive, budget-friendly menus at over 200 restaurants throughout the city.

The Region's Best Mexican Food is in a Snohomish County Parking Lot 

The Region’s Best Mexican Food is in a Snohomish County Parking Lot 

Hidden Gems Weekend Market is again open for business

Among the 20 aisles of some 300 vendors selling everything from Native American beadwork to the classic flea market assortments of knickknacks and hardware, sits the Northwest's biggest and best assortment of regional Mexican cuisine, street foods, and snacks.

Tastes of Oaxaca

Tastes of Oaxaca

Alebrijes Oaxaca Kitchen food truck rolls into White Center 

Colorful strands of papel picado flutter above the new turquoise Alebrijes Oaxacan Kitchen food truck in White Center, as if flagging down bystanders to stop in for memelas, tlayudas, and masa-thickened mushroom soup.

Kitchen Conversations With J. Kenji López-Alt

Kitchen Conversations With J. Kenji López-Alt

The Seattle chef discusses online feedback, appropriation, and his goals as a noted food writer

Currently, he's juggling projects for his YouTube channel, working on a new cookbook aimed at everyday cooking, writing another children's book, and launching a podcast with Deb Perlman of Smitten Kitchen.