Do you ever find yourself standing in front of the crowded, chaotic piles of cheese at Trader Joe’s, wondering what direction your life is headed and how a wedge of Gouda might fit into the future you’ve shaped for yourself? If not, you clearly haven’t stood there long enough. Wondering. Longing. Deliberating. You might fall in love with a cool new Scottish cheddar one month, only to be scorned and jilted the next. Remember when they had a flower-shaped Brie? What a week that was. Let me help you break through the existential buffet of the cheese mountain so you can make cute charcuterie boards for your friends and Santa, who I hear is into that kind of thing. Here are my favorite cheeses at Trader Joe’s right now. Slice them while you can.
Old Amsterdam: Premium Aged Gouda
If you’re going to bring one cheese to the party, it’s this one. It’s a salty, guaranteed crowd-pleaser that people always ask me about when I serve it, especially when it’s been given the proper amount of time to warm up—almost no one does that, right? Cheese foresight. Hard to come by. Give it 30 minutes or an hour, so its texture softens and its nutty flavor blooms.
Unexpected Cheddar Cheese
Had to include this legend, which claims to also resemble an aged Parmesan (hence “unexpected”), and who am I to disagree? This is the crumbly, barely sharp cheddar with mini salt crystals you want after school with a sleeve of Ritz, Oprah reruns, and a sip of Mom’s pinot. Also great with apples and Frasier reruns. Some things, like cheese and television, bear repeating.
Chèvre: Goat Cheese
This is a reliable chèvre for cheese plates and flinging into salads with dried cranberries. Trader Joe’s sells a few popular versions with blueberries and honey, but I prefer to do the cheese decorating myself (control issues). What you can also do is take a page from chef Alon Shaya and whip the log with a glug of heavy cream and olive oil in your littlest food processor, then serve in a pretty bowl with a drizzle of more olive oil (or honey!) and salt. Those raw radishes never had it so good.
Goat’s Milk Gouda Style Cheese
I love the barnyard note that goat cheeses have, really brings me back to nature. This wishes-it-was-Gouda goat’s milk is one of my new favorite cheeses at Trader Joe’s for its lightly farmy flavor and simple satisfaction. It has a vampiric complexion, like me in mid-December, and a bouncy, rubbery texture. This is the kind of cheese that sweats when left out near the radiator, or at the beach, but why did you bring cheese to the beach?
Cheddar & Gruyère Mélange Cheese
This is the cheese I buy for cooking when I don’t want to go broke buying full-on Gruyère. This blend might be mostly cheddar but it’s awesome in savory scones, buttermilk biscuits, and gougères. It has an industrial smooth texture with Gruyère’s trademark bite, melting easily, almost too easily, wherever it’s sprinkled.
Cambozola: Triple Cream Soft-Ripened Cheese
Blended with a French triple cream, this is the blue cheese for people who are afraid of blue cheese. Put a Play-Doh textured-wedge on your trusty wood cutting board and I promise a friend will say, “I normally don’t like blue cheese, but…” as they smush it across a cracker. It has a hint of smoke (the ash, I guess) that feels rustic and sophisticated.
Mini Basque Cheese
Fun and rich, with a thick, almost sticky texture. This half wheel of semifirm sheep’s-milk cheese begins with a hint of something grassy, then has a deep, buttery note, like movie theater popcorn. I believe that a good goat or sheep’s-milk cheese gives you a flash of psychic teleportation—suddenly you are the sheep, bowing her head toward a clump of dewy grass, chomping in the sunlight. Anyway. You want this with a big red wine or prosciutto, or as dessert with sherry. My only complaint? I wish you could buy the full wheel.
Fromage Pavé: A Square of Soft-Ripened Cheese
Fromage Pave is a square present you have to open and unwrap. Joy. It’s an extremely creamy, spreadable Brie upgrade with the mild glory of straight-up butter. Emphasis on mild. A cream bomb. Like all the cheeses on this list, it’s completely different when it’s not fridge-cold. Let it warm up, people! That might take an hour! When this isn’t “in season” at TJ’s, I pick up the Saint-André as a rebound. Because sometimes in life you have to deviate from the course and know everything will be okay, eventually, if you give it some time.