North Central Austin Fancy Cheese Counters, Ranked By Time Spent Buying Cheese

"Stef Schrader" (stefschrader)
04/13/2018 at 22:31 • Filed to: Cheese Buying, Cheese, Foodlopnik, Austin, Put Relish In Your Deviled Eggs

Get in my belly.

It is time once again for me to lure people over to my apartment with a selection of good cheeses and other snacks to sucker them into packing all my crap up into various vehicles and moving it to another location with more space and (gasp!) central aircon . So, I had to go cheese shopping.

I’ve noticed an odd pattern to buying cheese nearby: some stores really want me to linger around, man. I really should remember to go to the specific cheese-selling store that fits the amount of time I have to spend browsing the cheeses, because it varies from a grab ‘n’ go situation to a miniature CHEESE PARTY!!!

This is by no means an exhaustive list. Perhaps there is another cheese store I’m missing. Please tell me of this overlooked cheese store, and I may go there when I’m out of cheese. But here goes, from shortest to longest:

Central Market, N. Lamar : The no-nonsense cheese buying experience. Everything is neatly laid out by country of origin and type of cheese. If I just want the fromager d’affinois with herbs again, I know exactly where it is and don’t even have to interact with anyone to get it. If I am grouchy and angry and just need the cheese, this is the place. It’s all very orderly and pleasing in a weirdly soothing sort of way, like a mini-megastore of cheese. I take deep comfort in the well-planned efficiency of this cheese-buying experience.

Sometimes there are samples, but not of everything. The little bin of smaller cuts is your best bet to try stuff you haven’t thought of before on the cheap since samples are sporadic.

Get in, get out, see if the Lambo dealer has any rad stuff in the window on the way back, and boom: I am home with cheese. Probably too much cheese. It all looks good. Cheese is good. Time spent cheese shopping: Short.

Whole Foods, Downtown Flagship : There’s cheese over here, and other cheese over there, and a vast aisle of things in between the two displays of cheese. Oh, are you looking for a cheese dip or spread? Sometimes it’s on the first aisle back there, randomly, or up with the prepared stuff, because reasons? So confusing.

You want me to buy other things than cheese, Amazon. I see that generous offer to sell me a walk-around beer. I’m on to your dirty tricks, but I’m still mad you took the relish out of the deviled egg recipe. !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! New corporate overlords who don’t live in a place that does deviled eggs right, that’s who. Those used to be a near-dead-ringer for Grandma’s eggs and now they’re a pickle-free shell of their former greatness. So mad. Still mad. Yeah, I bought some anyway, but I’m mad. Let it be known that Stef is mad.

Wait, I was here for cheese? This is the problem lately with the Whole Foods downtown. Stuff moves around too often. It’s okay, and a really good cheese selection in its own right, roughly organized by style of cheese on both sides of the Vast Hold Of Cheese, Takeaway, Bakery, Dips And Uh, Stuff. Yet I find myself missing the searingly bright fluorescent lights and efficient order of the Central Market cheese-buying experience.

Counter staff is friendly and knowledgeable, and willing to cut off whatever size of cheese chunk you want. There’s also a box of small odds and ends for trying new cheese on the cheap before you decide that the giant wedge of lavender-flecked goat brie is really worth it. But dadgummit, where is the cheese I wanted to find? Do you no longer carry it, or is it hiding?

Why does it seem like selection is down when you are owned by the internet people now? Look, one bad experience with a super-raunchy raw milk cheese taught me to at least sniff and ask about unfamiliar cheeses before bringing them home, so I’m not gonna give up and order cheese through an app. That just ain’t right. You have to stock this in-person cheese aisle well and in an orderly fashion, guys. And put the dang relish back in the deviled eggs . Team relish for life. Time spent cheese shopping: Where the heck did they put the friggin’ pimiento cheese this time?

Antonelli’s, Duval : “Are you looking for any particular cheese, or just browsing? I can take you down the whole counter if you want. Want a sample? Here’s a sample. Try all the samples! Do you need a glass of wine? We have wine! That wine goes well with this cheese, over here. Want a sample? This cheese comes from an obscure sect of Bavarian monks who moved to the California coast, and you can really taste the salinity of the ocean air and the mosses favored by the goats on site come through in this cheese. Which cheese did you like the best? I can package those up, if you’d like.”

An extremely well-curated smaller selection of good cheeses in a dedicated cheese store, manned by friendly cheese people. I repeat: solely a cheese store. There are cheese-adjacent things like wine and charcuterie, but the focus is on cheese. They even keep track of prior cheese purchases, like some kind of fancy cheese registry. Egads.

This is a trap you should only fall for on or near payday. You have been warned. But it’s a cHeEsE pArTy TrAp!!! Have more cheese. Time spent cheese shopping: You went in for one long-craved chunk of Oma and $50+ later, you’ve spent your entire lunch break eating cheese samples, and small chunks of cheese on toothpicks have now become your lunch. Also, you now have enough cheese to last through the impending nuclear winter, so pray that C’thulhu doesn’t spring forth from the blast zone and eat you first. Now get back to work. You’re late.

DISCUSSION (25)

WilliamsSW > Stef Schrader
04/14/2018 at 00:09

Antonelli’s sounds like heaven, actually.

And yeah, Whole Foods is going south.

Stef Schrader > WilliamsSW
04/14/2018 at 01:15

it’s sooooo goooooooood

and 100 more > Stef Schrader
04/14/2018 at 01:18

Psssht, commoner!

I have a guy, named Gustavo. He’s a broker in grey-market artisanal cheeses. I meet him at The Triangle under cover of darkness, and doesn’t ever allow direct eye contact during our transactions. He takes payment only in dogecoin. Last week he sold me a wheel of this Mongolian brie, made with yak milk and horse blood, made by Communist nuns, and smuggled with a shipment of discount mini-fridges found for Cameroon.

Get on my cheese level.

Stef Schrader > and 100 more
04/14/2018 at 01:35

Yes.

YES.

PUT THE MONGOLIAN BRIE IN MY PIEHOLE.

shop-teacher > Stef Schrader
04/14/2018 at 09:10

I like the idea of a cheese store. We have the Mars Cheese Castle up in southern Wisconsin, which is great and all, but it’s become quite the tourist trap.

Did you manage to find a place with a garage for the ‘Lump?

Oh, and while I realize this may have me labeled as an unforgivable heritic ... I don’t like deviled eggs ... Or anything mayonnaise based.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Stef Schrader
04/14/2018 at 09:56

There is an Italian grocery store in Sacramento called Corti Brothers. At the deli counter you can experience cuts of cheese and cured meat that are approved by the Roman Gods. You can get everything from sharp cheddar to the stinkiest of blues that will compete with the worst mold you have ever seen. Go to the back of the store and you will find a counter filled with prime grade beef and endangered sea food. God I miss Corti Brothers.

Stef Schrader > shop-teacher
04/14/2018 at 18:00

I got..........another carport. But! This one has a little storage space attached, and it’s located behind the duplex. I get a second bedroom I can use for more stuff/office space, too, a bigger, functional kitchen and a quieter street where my car’s far less likely to get wrecked if I have to street-park it. Also, only one shared wall that’s mostly closet/tech space. And a yard someone else comes by to mow! I’m friggin’ excited.

I’m also extremely tempted to set a round sheet of glass on some spare wheels in the living room so I’m not eating up all the storage room with spare rimz. I’m like a table short and I also keep looking for like a nice buffet table I can prop the old spare 944 door onto as decor. Haha.

Stef Schrader > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
04/14/2018 at 18:02

This sounds like winning.

shop-teacher > Stef Schrader
04/14/2018 at 20:52

That’s a definite improvement!

I like your decorating style :)

Elric Naslund > Stef Schrader
04/15/2018 at 16:48

Me, a Philistine:

Super 1 Foods, Cypress Street, West Monroe: Right around the corner from my house. Oh look, Brookshire brand medium cheddar is on sale today, two for four dollars! S C O R E
Time spent cheese shopping: Less than the time spent waiting to make the left turn onto Cypress Street by Sonic.

Stef Schrader > shop-teacher
04/16/2018 at 01:29

Kinja'd!!!

(Sidenote: I need to mount that skid plate ASAP in the new place because apparently leaving it leaned up against my wall has rubbed a weird indentation into the plaster. Something something weirdo hard space-age materials something oops.)

Stef Schrader > Elric Naslund
04/16/2018 at 01:35

Brookshire’s is pretty good, TBH.

Elric Naslund > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 01:39

Brookshire’s has their own dairy plant, actually, probably explains it.

shop-teacher > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 07:17

D’oh!

If the walls are white, you could try the old dorm room will it with cheap toothpaste trick. Or just spackle.

Stef Schrader > shop-teacher
04/16/2018 at 09:48

There will be some HOT SPACKLE ACTION in here before I go.

Stef Schrader > Elric Naslund
04/16/2018 at 09:49

Their HQ is right by my mom’s place. Not a bad lil’ chain.

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 10:47

Hey! Your moving! wooo.

thejustache > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 13:24

I have no cheese experience (or really any experience) in Austin, but if you are ever visiting your Comrades in NYC and need a cheese fix I can recommend Murray’s on Bleecker Street. It sounds possibly similar to Antonelli’s in that it’s really just cheese and related accouterments. A long deli counter filled entirely with a great curated cheese selection. Take a number, wait in line, and then talk to some very knowledgeable cheese wizards. You want cheeses to go with a certain beer? Sure. Need a meat that pairs well with your selection, or want to built a platter of complimentary samples? They got you covered. They are also one of only a few places in the US to cave age their cheese themselves.

It’s been a long time for me since I made it down there but I remember Midnight Moon from Holland is a personal favorite. Also, nothing is more maddening (not to mention smelly) then getting home with a $20 chunk of delicious cave aged alpine cheese only to have your dog jump up and devour the entire thing off the counter while you finish unloading the car. Ask me how I know...

Xyl0c41n3 > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 13:27

Stef, HOW have you lived in Texas this long without central air?! I know Austin hits those triple digits in the summertime.

In fact, how do we know this is actually Stef who wrote this article? How can we be sure it wasn’t really a melted Stef/cheese amalgamation?

For Sweden > Stef Schrader
04/16/2018 at 15:01

Kinja'd!!!

IF YOU DON’T HAVE WINCO YOU’RE NOT A REAL TOWN

Stef Schrader > thejustache
04/16/2018 at 21:39

Oooooooooh! Cheese AND beer!

Also, my one true NYC regret is not visiting the artisanal mayonnaise store before it closed.

Stef Schrader > Xyl0c41n3
04/16/2018 at 21:41

Stef strong like moose. Angry moose. Sweaty moose. Excessively frugal moose.

(Smaller apartment + window units = mostly okayish, most of the time. Kinda sucks when it’s super hot or cold, though. So expensive to run. Now that I think of it, I haven’t had central heat and air for over a decade? This place didn’t have it. Grandpa’s house didn’t. My last apartment at BU didn’t, either. I kind of forgot how it works, I think? I assume I just set the little wall thing to a temperature and magic happens?)

Stef Schrader > For Sweden
04/16/2018 at 21:46

Kinja'd!!!

pffffffffttttttt

(not included above as the cheese section isn’t like, a dedicated cheeseperson, but they’re the parents of CM, so it sorta counts)

thejustache > Stef Schrader
04/17/2018 at 10:00

My one regret is not knowing there was an artisanal mayonnaise store in NYC at one point!

MaximilianMeen > Stef Schrader
04/17/2018 at 13:42

OK, so I’m a little late to the party here, but no Spec’s? Along with being the world’s greatest liquor store, they have a really nice selection of party foods, including cheese. Here is their online cheese shop . Also, unlike Wholy Overpriced Foods, Spec’s has a North Central location.