The Cheese Board: Collective Works

From the enormously popular Berkeley cheese shop and bakery, a collection of 150 classic recipes along with a history of the store and a cheese primer, all accompanied by 50 photographs.


The Cheese Board was there, a hole in the wall with a line out the door, before Chez Panisse was so much as a gleam in my eye. When the restaurant was conceived, I wanted it to be in North Berkeley so the Cheese Board would be nearby, because I knew I would be among friends.
-Alice Waters, from the Foreword


When a tiny cheese shop opened in Berkeley, California, in 1967, there was little hint of what the store-and the neighborhood-would grow into over the next 30 years. The Cheese Board became a collective a few years later and Chez Panisse opened across the street, giving birth to one of the country's most vibrant food neighborhoods, the epicenter of California's culinary revolution. Equal parts bakery, cheese store, pizzeria, and gathering place, the Cheese Board is a patchwork of the local community, where a passion for good food runs deep. THE CHEESE BOARD presents over 100 recipes for the store's classic breads, pastries, and pizzas, along with a history of the collective and an extensive cheese primer.

THE CHEESE BOARD COLLECTIVE hailed as a paradigm of collective-run business. The Cheese Board shop is frequently cited in national food media "best of" lists and is a major food destination in Berkeley, California.