Our Products
Cheese
The heart and soul of Beautiful Rind is the cheese case. From here, everything else finds its meaning. This case provides the cheese for our wonderful cheese boards, the delicious dishes from our kitchen, and the selections for our beloved classes. Our knowledgeable and friendly cheesemongers are here to help you find a cheese you’ll love.
From wonderfully modern Midwest cheeses to European classics, we look for good cheeses from good people. Producers who we know, we trust, and who hold themselves to the standards befitting our cheese loving customers. Our selections change daily as we keep things interesting, fresh and seasonally inspired.
Beverages
Does this go well with cheese? With our wines, beer, and non-alcoholic drinks, the answer is always yes. If we can’t imagine having it with cheese, charcuterie, or any of our other foods, we don’t carry it. Our staff are always ready to provide a recommendation and be sure the drinks go with the cheese you are having or help you build a charcuterie board around the perfect bottle.
Our wines are inspired by their pairing potential and the adventure of discovery. We carefully curate an easily shoppable selection of wines from European classics to more avant-garde natural winemakers with our primary thought being if it will elevate the cheese. We love finding wine-growing regions that don’t have the buzz you find at big stores. This lets you experience wine the same way you experience the first bite of new cheese. We’ve even got some pretty cool mentions in the press if you care about that kind of thing.
Our non-alcoholic beverage section is curated with the same care as our wines. We look for beverages that have all the wonderful flavor we want with cheese but not the alcohol that usually comes with it. Our NA options are always tasted by our staff who range from Francophilic wine nerd to sober NA beverage explorer.
We’ve also got a variety of local Chicago beers, curated fortified wines, a few after dinner spirits, and a couple other fun options. As always, all our food and drink is focused around pairing you with perfect cheese experience.
Tinned Fish & Conservas
Fish and Cheese? These are two of the primary food groups in the average cheesemonger’s diet. You’ll often see our staff enjoying a tin of fish for lunch. After all, as professional cheese eaters, we need as many Omega-3s as we can get. Seriously though, we’ve long been fans of tinned fish and are delighted at their popularity. We’re continuously looking for new tins and are always bringing in lots of fun, unique conservas.
How would you pair these with cheese? Well, eating them both at the same time can be a challenging (though not impossible) pairing. For most conservas, we look at them as an appetizer for cheese or a healthier alternative to cured meats.
Want to give them a try or find a new favorite? Don’t be intimidated in picking out something new to try or be too shy to ask questions of our cheesemongers. From sardines to scallops, Denmark to Portugal, the world of tinned fish can be confusing. Luckily, we’ve got a staff that probably just ate a tin or two in the past few days.
More Delicious Things….
Cheese pairings are what we do, whether it’s pairing a cheese up with a person or finding the perfect thing to go with your cheese. With this spirit, we carry a variety of other delicious things you’d expect to find at a cheese shop, plus a few other fun things.
We’ve got a big selection of CDVs (cheese delivery vehicles) from all sorts of crackers to our beloved baguettes, even a few gluten free options. To keep filling out the board, we’ve also got a range of nuts, jams, honeys, and some surprises like our pumpkin spiced pumpkin seeds (for our nut-allergy customers). Not to forget the actual charcuterie for your charcuterie board, we carry a variety of hams, salamis, and a few pork-free options.
Like our cheeses, our selection of these items is always changing, and our online menu only highlight a small selection of what we offer in store.
Chocolate Bars & Sweets
Working in cheese has many benefits, but being part of a passionate food loving community is one of the best. If you want proof, think about the fact that in addition to the many wonderful cheesemakers, we also get to work with craft chocolate importers and producers! While cheese makes a great dessert, what do you do when cheese is your main course? You have a chocolate flight of course!
We carefully curate our chocolate selection with the same love of food that we use in curating our cheeses. This means we are sourcing responsibly produced bars from great people around the world. We’ve got a wide selection from bars made from wild cacao harvested by Indigenous peoples of the rainforest to single-origin bars from farmer-owned plantations in Asia. Want to learn more? Stop by the shop or keep an eye out for our occasional Cheese & Chocolate pairing class!
We’ve also got a few other fun sweet options for a great gift or a tasty treat. We carry Big Picture Farm goat milk caramels, Effies Oatcakes, our roof honey, and a few other sweet treats.