The ritual of family dinner is one that I am holding onto as tightly as possible, even as sports and other activities take over our evening hours. Lately, I’ve found myself thinking about Jenny Rosenstrach’s writing about ‘hooks’ in her cookbook The Weekday Vegetarians (Jenny is the author of Dinner, a Love Story, and a committed family dinner advocate). She wrote that the vegetarian dinners that land best for her family are the ones with a ‘hook,’ or something that makes the meal just a little special: maybe a great sauce, maybe a special preparation, or some other extra that elevated the experience.
This is a very long way for me to say: I have found my go-to ‘hook,’ and it is brie style cheese.
My parents brought a round of Acme Farms Petit Brie to dinner recently and it not only elevated our meal, but it reduced complaints from my 13-year-old about everything else that was served – no small feat, considering that I was serving it with a main-dish salad. 
Cheese name: Petit Brie
Producer: Acme Farms
Purchased from: Town & Country Market
What even is Brie?
Brie is a style of cheese that originated in France. It’s a soft, creamy cheese with a white, bloomy, edible rind. Acme Farm’s Petit Brie is produced in the Acme Valley in Whatcom County, WA, and shares all of these characteristics. Acme Farms describes the Petit Brie as mild and buttery, with a creamy, velvet texture. In our experience, it was creamy and slightly sweet, with a hint of mushroom flavor.
Tasting Notes & Pairings
Our cheese plate at dinner that night was classic: crackers made from a baguette and sliced pink lady apple. This was delicious, and is my go-to for all brie style cheeses, especially when the apples are tart and crisp. A tip: let the cheese sit out at room temperature for an hour or so before serving, so that it comes up to room temp and becomes soft and melty.
The revelation, however, was when we paired the cheese with the fresh cherries that were also on the table. On a whim, we tried them with the Petit Brie and the combo was quickly pronounced ‘the best.’ The cherries brought crunch and floral taste, accentuating the sweetness of the cheese and complementing the creamy texture. Later, as I was reading The Complete Cheese Pairing Cookbook by Morgan McGlynn Carr, I saw that one of the photos in the book shows this exact pairing, validating our experience.
Where to buy cheese:
Acme Farms Cheese is sold throughout western Washington. I found the Petit Brie at the Ballard Town & Country Market; it looks like it’s also sold at PCC and Metropolitan Markets.