59 cheeses

Aosta Valley, Italy

The alpine melter behind fonduta, made from a single breed’s raw milk.

Auvergne / Puy-de-Dôme, France

The gentlest of the great French blues, in a tall narrow cylinder.

Lombardy / Piedmont, Italy

The soft, sweet Gorgonzola — a blue you can eat with a spoon.

Po Valley, Italy

Parmigiano’s older, larger, gentler cousin from across the Po Valley.

Zealand, Denmark

The buttery Danish table cheese that gave this catalogue its name.

Fribourg, Switzerland

No holes. Whatever the cartoons told you, that is Emmentaler.

Leiden, Netherlands

Gouda’s spiced cousin, packed with cumin and caraway seed.

Allgäu, Germany

The bacterium that makes it smell also lives on human feet. Genuinely.

Menorca, Spain

A square-edged Balearic cheese, rubbed orange with paprika and olive oil.

Iowa, United States

Made since 1941 by the washing-machine family, from a university recipe.

Lille / Flanders, France

A bright orange sphere with a pitted rind, courtesy of live mites.

Franche-Comté, France

The one with the black line through the middle.

Alsace / Vosges, France

The Vosges monks’ cheese: enormous nose, sweet-tempered paste.

Oka, Quebec, Canada

Brought to Quebec in 1893 by a Trappist monk fleeing France.

Northern India, India

Acid-set, unaged, rennet-free, and it never melts.

Emilia-Romagna, Italy

A 38 kg wheel, twelve months minimum, and a hammer test before it can be sold.

Wisconsin, United States

The most-decorated cheese in American history, made only from summer pasture milk.

Normandy, France

A square Norman washed rind that has been made since the 1100s.

Lombardy / Veneto, Italy

Stretched curd hung on ropes and aged with kid rennet until it bites back.

Oaxaca, Mexico

Stretched into a rope and wound into a ball, like mozzarella’s cousin in Oaxaca.

Valais, Switzerland

A cheese named after the act of scraping it off the fire onto a plate.

Haute-Savoie, France

Born of tax evasion in the Alps, now the soul of tartiflette.

Leicestershire, England

Cheddar-adjacent, dyed with annatto since farmers wanted their milk to look richer.

Oregon, United States

Wrapped in brandy-soaked vine leaves. Named world’s best cheese in 2019.