If only cheese were as easy to ship as books, I would order every cheese on this list. Having just polled some leading retailers about the cheeses that outperformed for them this year, I’m dying to try all these gems. At least I now have the start of a must-taste list for 2024, which is how I hope you will think of this collection of breakout stars. Some of these cheeses are limited production and hardly leave their region (yet); others may not be in your local store right now, but you can request them. Although I asked the mongers to name cheeses that wowed their customers (and tell us why), I’m pretty sure most respondents chose personal favorites. Given that these folks are the best in the business, their replies make a great bucket list for the year ahead.

Raymond Hook

Capella Cheese
Atlanta
Our 2-year-old Comté Reserve from Marcel Petite (top image, left) was our biggest-selling cheese for the year. Our customers love it and keep coming back for it. (Janet’s note: This extra-aged Comté, which Marcel Petite calls Comté Sagesse, is astonishing—deeply colored, with plentiful crystals, a fudgy texture and an intensely beefy, oniony flavor. Gordon Edgar of Rainbow Grocery, another top monger, told me it might be the best Comté he had ever tasted.)

Widmer’s 10-year-old Cheddar is a top American cheese for us. It is sharp and crumbly with big flavor. We also sell the 1-year Widmer cheddar, and what a difference 9 years make. This is the sharp Cheddar people want.

Benjamin Roberts

France 44 Deli & Market
Minneapolis

Finca Pascualete Retorta is the most unctuous raw sheep’s milk cheese you could ever hope to find. It’s the exact cheese for when a customer wants to groove on something full-flavored but doesn’t want to commit to a bigger round.

The rate of innovation at Alemar Cheese has been through the roof since Charlotte Severino took over as head cheesemaker in 2021. Apricity (top image, right) is a cutie! It looks like a little snowball. It’s lactic set, bright and buttery on the palate and plays nice with just about any accoutrements. For sure it helps that it’s local, but dang is it a remarkable cheese.

Jenny Eastwood

Smallgoods
La Jolla, CA

Veronica Pedraza and Blakesville Creamery were among our standouts. Veronica is utilizing goat and sheep milk in really surprising ways. One of her latest, St. Germain Sur Lie, is a beautiful, pure white goat cheese rubbed in Pinot Noir lees.

American original: Perrystead Intergalactic

Perrystead Dairy in Philadelphia is an urban creamery, and Yoav’s cow’s milk cheeses are truly originals. Intergalactic is fluffy, yet dense with flavor, and it won a silver ribbon at this year’s World Cheese Awards.

Omer Seltzer of Mt. Eitan Cheese in Sonoma County is an exciting cheesemaker, and I can’t wait to have more of his cheeses. His little goat’s milk dome, Moni; the grapeleaf-wrapped Gefen; and the semi-firm Raya are my favorites from his lineup. (Janet’s note: Mt. Eitan Ady is a superb goat feta, mellow and creamy. Contact the creamery for availability in Northern California.)

Sam Rollins

Cow Bell
Portland, OR

We had some phenomenal wheels of Beaufort d’Alpage come through Cow Bell, incredibly complex and offering a world of flavors in every bite. Capriole Creamery had a banner year (but what else is new). Capriole’s Sofia and Piper’s Pyramid shone bright and beautiful, and Old Kentucky Tomme really blew us away in the fall.

We brought in a handful of “new to us” cheeses this year. Two highlights were both aged sheep cheeses but very different: Sigma, a relative newcomer made by a farmstead Manchego producer; and Anabasque, a Pyrenees-inspired tomme from the wonderful Landmark Creamery in Wisconsin. Sigma is made from the same raw milk that goes into the creamery’s superb Manchego, but it is a cooked-curd, almost alpine-style cheese, full of toasty, nutty, earthy richness. Anabasque has a reputation at Cow Bell as a go-to choice for cocktail, wine and beer pairings. Depending on that pairing, it can be funky; or reminiscent of black cherry, peach and almond; or buttery and grassy. It is always a treat.

Jeff DiMeo

East Side Cheese & Provisions
Providence, RI

Our distributor, Brad Dubé (Food Matters Again), called to share that he had tasted the most amazing natural-rinded Gouda at this year's American Cheese Society conference. Without another word, I said, “Send it.” We have had more fun introducing our guests to Urban Stead Gouda than just about anything else in our shop. We love telling the story of this Cincinnati creamery and watching people enjoy their first taste.

Rockflower (Fluehblüemli) from our friends at Gourmino is my personal favorite to sell. Nothing makes me happier than introducing this stunning Swiss cheese to our customers.

Unrelated breakout star: Fortune Favors nuts out of Wisconsin. Get your hands on a jar of their "Everything" pecans. They belong on every cheese board.

Todd Brown

109 Cheese & Wine
Ridgefield, CT

We have gone through 3 wheels of Le Gruyère AOP Surchoix (12- to 15-month) in the last 8 weeks! Such a crowd pleaser and so many people have no idea how amazing Gruyère can be.

Lastly to mention this year is butter! Rodolphe Le Meunier’s Beurre de Baratte is life changing for our customers. We sample it periodically and some people actually ask what kind of cheese it is. Great butter is so important.