Tilsiter Cheese from Switzerland

How should the cheese be stored?

Hard cheeses have been carefully selected to withstand a longer transit time. Don’t worry if it arrives a bit warm or a bit cold – cheese is durable. Hard, aged cheeses stay good for a long time. Many days for sure. Sometimes weeks. Bigger hunks of cheese last longer. If it looks and smelled as expected, it’s likely still great.

Soft cheeses and cheese spreads (like pimento and liptauer) are best eaten within a week or two of receiving them.

We wrap hand-cut wedges of cheese in a cheese bag before shipment, and you can continue to keep the cheese in that cheese bag. The next best option would be parchment or wax paper. After you open the cheese for a nibble, any remainders can be put back into the bag and closed with a simple roll or fold. 

Store cheese in the fridge, ideally in the spot closest to 50 degrees. That will likely be the door of your refrigerator or in a drawer where the temperature is consistent but not too cold. Do not freeze your cheese! Cheese is a living thing. Freezing will stop the natural processes that keep cheese so tasty.

What if it’s got a little mold on it? A little mold is no problem. It’s a good sign, it means the cheese is alive. Scrape it off with a knife. But if there’s a lot of mold and it’s turning dark and funky it’s time to say goodbye.

What’s the best way to serve cheese?

Regardless of the kind of cheese, it’s best to take it out of the fridge about 20 to 30 minutes before serving it. Cheese tastes better at room temperature. It makes a world of difference: the aromas expand, becoming more complex; more of the fat spreads on your tongue, which makes the flavor more intense. When cheese is warm you’ll eat less of it and enjoy it more.

First things first: it’s not a cave.

Cheesemongers universally refer to their cheese storage rooms as caves but these rooms have about as much in common with a cave as astroturf has in common with the field of dreams. Cheese caves are commercial coolers. Usually walk-ins, which is industry speak for a refrigerator big enough for a full-sized door.

Our cave is ten feet wide, twenty feet long, about the size of a short container truck. It is stark white and sits right in the middle of our warehouse, across the pick line from the bread bagging tent. Between the two they mark the two poles of our operations. Bread and cheese. Both made by hand. Cut by hand. Wrapped by hand. Traditional, practically ancient foods.

We work mostly in whole wheels of cheese.

That’s the way the cheesemakers make them and that’s the way we buy them. We haul them into the cheese cave and cut them open by hand. Sometimes with a big knife. Sometimes with a cheese wire: a thick steel cable with handles that the cheesemonger uses to glide through cheese like butter.

And sometimes you’ve got to tackle Parmigiano Reggiano. Those 80 pound wheels have a hide as tough as a stegosaurus. They need to be coaxed open with a set of wedge shaped knifes that become part of every cheesemonger’s rite of passage. A freshly cracked wheel’s aroma is beguiling. Every one who splits one stops for a moment, puts their face up to the cut surface, and inhales. Fresh shards of parmesan always flake off too – cheesemonger’s treat.

Once a wheel is open we cut pieces of cheese and hand wrap them in waxed cheese bags.

If we cut a piece that weighs exactly the right size on the scale we ring the bell – perfect cut! We send the just-cut cheese out to be packed in boxes, then wait for the container to empty and return to let us know we need to cut a few more. We do this all day long for the 50+ cheeses we carry. On our busiest day in December we’ll do it thousands of times.

That means your cheese is essentially cut to order.

It spends a few hours at most from when it’s cut to when it’s packed to ship. It sounds simple – and it is. But it’s also rare. Most companies that ship cheese these days don’t cut cheese to order. They ship cheese that has been cut long ago – weeks, even months – and sealed in cry-o-vac. It’s not terrible, but remember that once a cheese gets cut it never gets better. It fades. Cry-o-vac slows the fading, but if it spends a long time cut in a wrapper its flavor will become a shadow of itself.

Freshness matters, even when you’re talking about aged cheese.

The primary culprit for flavor loss is air. Air surrounded the wheel of the cheese, of course, but it didn’t penetrate the paste inside thanks to the rind. Now the cheese, with its insides showing, is under siege by air. Air swoops in to dry out the cheese, carrying the environment’s off-aromas and unwanted bacteria along the way.

To protect the cheese’s cut face from air’s ravages we wrap each cheese in a waxed cheese bag. This bag lets the cheese breathe yet keeps it from drying out. The wax lining keeps them in perfect shape. It lasts, too – reuse it for other cheese, it’ll keep almost any hard cheese in great condition.

1. First things first: What cheeses should you get for a cheese board?

The classic answer is to get a variety. Get a young soft cheese. An aged harder cheese. Maybe a blue. Maybe a goat or sheep’s milk option. That is still a safe and delicious way to go. But it’s not the only strategy.

An old vs. new world pairing is fun, too. Try two clothbound cheddars, like Cabot from Vermont and Montgomery’s from England. Or a classic Swiss Gruyère and a cheese inspired by it, like Pleasant Ridge Reserve from Wisconsin.

You could expand that comparison to a trio. Try three goat cheeses, one fresh, one bloomy, one well aged and firm. Or three blues. You get the idea.

Or perhaps my favorite of all: just one giant piece of cheese. Get a big hunk of Parmigiano Reggiano, stab it with the old, weird knife you’ve got lurking in the drawer.

2. Then add some accompaniments.

Pick items with a lot of flavor. When you eat something flavorful, a little bit goes a long way. I like to go for variety. I’ll start with some sweet pairings, like fresh or dried fruits, preserves, and honeys. Then I’ll add a few savory pairings, like bread, crackers, nuts, olives, pickles, or cured meats like salami or prosciutto. There’s no “right” answer as to what you should include—it’s your cheese board, so the only “right” items are the ones you like best!

3. Don’t give me the cold cheese.

Serve cheeses at room temperature. Take them out of the fridge about 30 minutes before serving. I can’t place enough emphasis on this advice. A cheese at 40° and one at 65° taste completely different. The aromas expand, become more complex. More of the fat spreads on your tongue, which makes the flavor more intense. When cheese is warm you’ll eat less of it and enjoy it more. The same goes for cured meats: give salamis and hams a chance to warm up for twenty minutes and you’ll taste a world of difference.

4. Play with the plating.

All those old platters, the hand-me-downs and vintage shop finds—now is the time to use them. If they’re interesting, serve cheese on them, please. Slate, wood, porcelain, or cut glass are awesome. In a pinch you can use a big cutting board or even a cookie sheet. The same rule goes for cutlery. Bring out the strange Baroque silver, the ivory-handled one-offs, the loot that you never get to share.

As for the presentation, if you want to go all out do a quick Instagram or Google Image search for #cheeseboard. There are some crazy good Van Goghs of cheese out there, sharing their art with the interweb world. You could use those as inspiration to create your own masterpiece, or keep it simple and let folks dig right in. Either way, have fun with it!