If you’ve had a hard day at work, I highly suggest unwinding at Northeast specialty market Foster & Dobbs, where you can chase all your troubles and cares away with one of their fantastic DIY cheese plates and a bottle of wine or something from the by-the-glass menu–which usually offers a white, red, and rosé for $5-$6. To create your cheese plate, choose your favorite cheese(s) from Foster & Dobb’s well-stocked cheese case and then select one of three accompaniments to complement it–Savory (olives, marcona olives, bread), Sweet (dried fruit, hazelnuts, bread), or Ploughman’s (greens, bread, and mustard or chutney). The plate setup is $5, plus the cost of your cheese, by weight. Sit back with your wine and cheese at one of the little indoor or outdoor bistro tables and watch the after work crowd as they trickle in–the young professional couple buying two bottles of red wine for their dinner party, an older professorial-looking twosome discussing an NPR story on Sudan while choosing charcuterie, a Levi’s-clad 20-something sampling the Yakima Applewood Smoked Salt, two stylish sisters speaking French but obviously arguing over the Fromage d’Affinois, and a grandmother who smells faintly of lavendar and cats spooning olives into a to-go tub. Listen to the soft jazz music and eye the table of chocolate hopefully and one by one, the irksome memories of your boss’s inane requests and unfavorite coworker’s outbursts will vanish, and you’ll be refreshed and renewed, or at least a little buzzed, happy and mellow. That’s the power of wine and cheese.
