Each photo is taken with the 3 avaialble sizes to purchase on display. It can sometimes be hard to know how much cheese to buy. As a general rule of thumb, we would recommend roughly between 100 and 150 grams per person for after dinner, and a bit more if cheese is the focus of the meal.
If you are buying cheese to serve over a couple of days or as part of a buffet, it is advisable to buy a few larger pieces. This will both look better and keep better than many small bits.
To help visualise weights, a good tip is to consider that a regular supermarket pack of butter weighs 500 grams.

The height of what a cheese can achieve is dictated by the quality of the milk. When cheese is made by farmers, they have the opportunity to start their cheesemaking decisions in the pastures and their breeding programmes, and they see the consequences directly in the vat. No milk purchasing contract, however specialised, can compete with this fine-grained control. In all of our signage and in our cheese descriptions online, we specify the source of the milk, to help our customers make informed decisions about what to buy.

Farmhouse cheese is handmade and thus varies with each day’s production and changes as it matures. As such it is necessary to apply a common sense approach to cheese care and respond to the cheese you have in front of you, as opposed to following rigid guidelines.

Cut pieces of cheese should be kept in the refrigerator to slow the growth of mould on their cut surfaces. However, it is important to be aware that refrigerated cheese is more likely to dry out, particularly if it is not wrapped.

The best option is to keep the cheese wrapped in its waxed paper or cling film for hard cheeses within a box in the fridge. The container will help to prevent the cheese from drying out and prevent the cheese from absorbing flavours.

It is very important not to serve your cheese when it’s too cold as cold cheese can taste bland and inert. As a general rule of thumb you should bring it out of the fridge a few hours before you plan to serve it. You should keep your cheese wrapped whilst it is coming up to room temperature, to avoid any risk of it drying out. If it is especially warm you should reduce the amount of time the cheese is out of the fridge accordingly.

There are an array of factors which affect how long cheese will last, and so it is difficult to give a prescriptive answer without knowing which cheese you have, what size the piece is and what storage method you are using.

We expect these cheeses to be eaten within the next week or two. If you need your cheese to last, buy larger pieces as these last for longer. Buy it as close to when you want to serve it as possible (although if you are having your cheese delivered, also remember to allow for a few days leeway in case of delivery disruption). If you have a specific shelf life concern, you are always welcome to contact us and we will advise as best we can.

All our cheeses are pasteurised.

All are apart from the Barrys Bay products.

We typically cut cheese to order on the day of dispatch to ensure that it is as fresh as possible when it arrives with you.

We ship on Monday-Thursday. Delivery is next day nationwide. Rural up to 2 days (at buyers risk).

Auckland is free delivery with orders over $45. North Island is $5.80. South Island is $9.90. Rural deliveries are sent at the buyers risk. 

No. We don’t have a minimum order value. We do ask that you bear in mind the amount of packaging generated to send items either via courier or to our shops for collection. Whilst it's great to order little and often, we do like to operate in a sustainable way and we’d like your help to achieve this.

Please contact us and we will track with the courier. You will recieve an order confirmation which you can also track on the NZ Couriers website.

It may sound obvious, but the most important thing to do is to unpack the box! You need to check that everything has arrived safely, as you expected, and that none of the cheeses have been damaged in transit. If there are any issues, please contact us as soon as possible. If all is well, pop your cheese in the fridge until a few hours before you are ready to serve it.

At this stage we only ship in New Zealand.

If for any reason you have received an incorrect item or you're order has not been delivered please contact us at sales@nzcheese.co.nz . We may not be able to refund any consumed or disposed of items. It may take up to days to process a credit to your nominated account. Unfortunately we cannot issue a credit if more than 24 hours have passed since the arrival of your order.

Xtra have recently updated their anti-spam policy to reject any automated emails which unfortunately includes order confirmations and tracking updates. If your email is with Xtra and you would like an update on your order please email us at sales@nzcheese.co.nz, we'll provide you with an update as soon as we can.

The world of cheese and the interests of our customers are constantly changing and evolving. If you have a question about New Zealand Cheese that isn’t covered here, please drop us a line via our contact us page.