While the ladies and I were sipping wine and getting to know each other night at our wine group the conversation naturally turned to cheese. One of the women said she should run to her car and get her cheese book. I was like, what cheese book do you have in your car? As I pulled out The Cheese Chronicles from my purse. She started laughing and said, I have that book. Then she told me I need to come get it signed. What, get my book signed!
On a very dreary Thursday evening Jess and I tracked to the one place what we don’t go very often, the suburbs. As we shook the rain off of us as we pull up a stool at the Anderson Kroger’s very nice tasting bar. There standing behind the bar was, Liz Thorpe. I was so freakin’ excited, but I played cool. The girl from wine club saw me and came over and introduced us. Apparently she had already heard about me carrying my book in my purse. I will admit that I was slightly embarrassed, but if I didn’t carry it in my purse, I would never have knows about the cheese and wine tasting…or got this
- I wanted her to write Molly gives great presents, but this is what she wrote
Lets get down to business of the cheese and wine tasting. Overall we don’t keep updated on what is going on at the different grocery stores. If it wasn’t for reading The Cheese Chronicles, I wouldn’t have known that Murray’s Cheese had contracted with Kroger to begin with.
The tastes were $.50 each up to 4 tasting. I know that Ohio has some weird law about paying for tastings. I don’t know what was up with the only 4 tastes. 4 whites and 3 reds were offered. They made suggestions on the order, but nothing was set in stone. There were 4 cheese and all but one paired with the red wine, which was a score for us. The selection of cheeses were fun, but still familiar. It is always nice seeing what flavors work well with other flavors. The value of the tasting was spot on, but if you go to a lot of wine tastings there is a good chance you would have tasted most of the wines. Overall though I was presently surprised buy how nice the tasting was. It made me wonder if other grocery store tasting are like this.
As and FYI: I have an e-mail out to my manager friend about learning more about the tastings. I have search the Kroger website, but have found nothing so far about when tasting happens. I recieve a flyer when I got to the store, but I am thinking that can’t be their only advertising. Plus, I would never learn about them
As for Murray’s, the selection of cheese is amazing. My new favorite is the lemon stilton, you should give it a try. The staff is very knowledgeable if you have any questions. If you like to just browse freely, the descriptions are spot on. I even took a picture of one because I thought it was so good (it is a little hard to read tough).
I just wanted to compliment your photos again. You do a great job!
I am always surprised and how great grocery store tastings are. They really do know their wine and cheese.
I think it’s awesome you carry your book in your purse. I used to carry a can opener. Not as easy to autograph if you ask me. LOL
I used to sell Alamos way back in the day! It’s pretty good, but I didn’t know it was in Kroger now! I’m looking forward to checking out these cheese selection and indulging in some of that Lemon Stilton!
Damn, a cheese tasting is so right up my alley! With the expansion of Murray’s into the Newport Kroger, maybe there will be more to come (and without the weird Ohio state restrictions on tastings). I wonder if we had enough interest if Murray’s would do a seminar or workshop — maybe once a month or quarter or something to help educate people on various cheeses, pairings, and so forth. I’d so be into that!
I love that you keep that book in your purse! I did a cheese tasting at the Murray’s in Kenwood. It was pretty good … tried 4 or 5 different Italian cheeses. But there was no wine, which was a pity. Now I want to try the lemon stilton!