Cheese: Storage, Freezing, Reheating and Pregnancy Answers

This page pulls together the 41 cheese answers on the site: how long it keeps, whether you can freeze it, whether you can reheat it, how long it can be left out, what the date on the label means, where it stands in pregnancy and what applies while breastfeeding. The table gives the short answer for each; the page behind each row gives the full reasoning, the source and the exceptions.

In pregnancy: Most cheese is safe during pregnancy — hard cheeses and pasteurised soft cheeses are fine. Avoid mould-ripened soft cheeses and soft blue cheeses unless cooked.

Worth knowing: Hard cheese keeps so well because it is low in moisture, high in salt and acidic, so most bacteria cannot grow in it. That is the reason the unopened and opened times are so far apart: an unopened block is sealed from the air, whereas once you cut it the surface dries out, picks up mould spores and absorbs fridge smells.