Monger Musings 001

Monger Musings 001

It’s officially December on the Vineyard, which means that it’s pitch black at about 4:30PM. Every bit of me wants to hibernate, but there’s so much work to be done!

It almost marks one year since I left my job in corporate America to go full time cheese. It’s been a somewhat halting process, since I was constrained by a serious lack of communal commercial kitchen infrastructure on this island. Lucky for me, my family is full of entrepreneurial foodies, so we were able to band together and purchase a storefront of our own. The spot is proudly named Catboat Coffee Co. located in the Tisbury Marketplace in Vineyard Haven. A catboat is a type of sailboat iconic to New England that is a multi-faceted workhorse (appropriate since we are bringing three multi-faceted food businesses together under one roof!). It’s going to be a coffee shop and specialty food store that will serve as the home of my brother-in-law Naji’s Lebanese food spot, Epicure, as well as my cut-to-order cheese counter!

The renovations to the storefront have been meticulously made and are finally nearing completion. When we stared the work back in April of this year, we thought we might get done in time to catch some of the summer season (ha!). Maybe it’s for the best that we will be starting in the winter doldrums. It’ll give Islanders something new to get excited about in a season that typically features businesses closing for a few months. Are we crazy for thinking this timing will work in our favor? Quite possibly!

I’ll be using this space to document the shop owner journey and serve as a catchall for other random cheesy links that catch my eye. Here’s this week’s offering:

🧀 Love to see First Lady Jill Biden advocating for American-made cheeses at a state dinner with the French president. (The Guardian)

🧀 I’ve never tried yak’s milk cheese! And now I really want to! (Cheese Professor)

🧀 This interview with cheesemonger Alisha Norris Jones is wonderful. (Chicago Reader)

🧀 Adam encouraged me to participate in CMI NYC this past June and for that I am eternally grateful. His excitement for cheese is contagious and oozes throughout this interview. (Forbes)