Purchasing and Storing

Cheeses are best freshly cut, so avoid prewrapped pieces when possible. Storing cheese is always a balancing act: cheese must “breathe” or release moisture, but it also needs to stay moist and not dry out. Whenever possible, buy cheeses on the day of serving and keep the wedges at cool room temperature on a board or under a glass dome. When refrigerating, plastic wrap is the common, though imperfect, solution. The cheese won’t breathe, but it also won’t dry out. Use waxed paper for wrapping fresh and soft-ripened cheeses, which need to breathe the most in order to ripen properly.