Food Hacks: Cheese. Tips & Storage Solutions

This may come as a surprise, but when cheese is wrapped in plastic wrap it can no longer intake oxygen—in short, it suffocates, resulting in an ammonia flavor and possibly even harmful bacteria. Moreover, plastic wrap can also cause the cheese to taste like plastic. So if your cheese was wrapped in plastic at the supermarket, rewrap it as soon you get home.

Parchment paper allows the cheese to breathe, but also protects it from drying out. Make sure to write the type of cheese, as well as the date on which you purchased it, on the tape.

To help your firmer cheeses retain moisture and to prevent the dehydration process,
put the cheese inside an open plastic bag after it is wrapped in parchment paper. This should help keep the cheese from becoming an unappetizing rock while still allowing it to breathe.

Keep your wrapped cheese in a crisper in the fridge, which will have the most consistent temperature and humidity. Avoid storing in the door, where it is vulnerable to temperature swings.

Next time you need to grate some cheese, try using a large, clean zipper-lock bag to hold both grater and cheese. The bag lets you grate with clean hands and eliminates flyaway bits. Leftover grated cheese is ready for storage in a handy bag.

It’s easy to shred semisoft cheeses such as mozzarella or cheddar in the food processor—until, of course, a big chunk sticks in the feed tube or gums up the shredding disk. Avoid this problem by spraying the feed tube, disk, and workbowl of your food processor with a light coating of vegetable oil spray before you begin.

When you need room-temperature cream cheese to make frosting and don’t have time to wait, speed things up by submerging the foil-wrapped package in a bowl of warm water. It should only take about 10 minutes for the cheese to soften.