Old Vacuum sealed cheese?

I'd eat it. FWIW, my wife cleaned out the fridge at the local community house due to the shutdown and found an unopened 2-3 y.o. "havarti". Nothing wrong with it other than some crystallization of salts in the cheese. We ate it with no ill effect.

Rind is probably the dye. I notice this with Oka cheese even well before "best-by" date.

I would do it since it's a hard cheese.

Looks like it's good to 2021. Go for it!

Agree. I would go for it. If there is no mold then go for it. If you are worried around the rind, then you can a larger chunk of the rind off.

I once found cheap mozzarella still in the vacuum sealed plastic, hidden in the back of the fridge, and it was maybe 1 year past its best-before date. No discoloration/mold but it obviously hardened. When I opened it, the smell and taste were almost exactly like provolone! Was delicious on pizza and cheesesteak sandwiches!

EastGTARedFlagger wrote: ↑ I once found cheap mozzarella still in the vacuum sealed plastic, hidden in the back of the fridge, and it was maybe 1 year past its best-before date. No discoloration/mold but it obviously hardened. When I opened it, the smell and taste were almost exactly like provolone! Was delicious on pizza and cheesesteak sandwiches!

Lol
Made some provolone with some behind the back fridge cheese.
Next thing “found a cucumber swimming in some juice... it made a pickle! Had great burgers afterwards.”

Macx2mommy wrote: ↑ Agree. I would go for it. If there is no mold then go for it. If you are worried around the rind, then you can a larger chunk of the rind off.

I don't eat it but blue cheese has mold and you can eat it.

I like blue cheese on certain things. I don’t general eat moldy things on purpose but invariably had a few items where I can taste the mold. My kids and are alive and it’s a learning experience. They know the difference between past best before and do not at.

jackrabbit000 wrote: ↑ I don't eat it but blue cheese has mold and you can eat it.

Not only has mold but it's been deliberately inoculated. You can even buy mold cultures to make cheese (have a couple in my fridge but haven't used them due to no place to ripen). Camembert and Brie for example. Lots of others. However, those are specific cultures that are safe if not merely benign for human consumption.

Cheese was outstanding!! Even had the thin oil? film on it. Was half expecting something to happen once the seal was broken. Perhaps the big concern is how long it lasts once you have opened it.

Everywhere I looked even down to the specific type of cheese suggests no longer than 12 months unopened sealed etc.

https://www.stilltasty.com/Fooditems/index/19128

May help that I do keep the fridge quite cold to begin with.

thriftshopper wrote: ↑ Not only has mold but it's been deliberately inoculated. You can even buy mold cultures to make cheese (have a couple in my fridge but haven't used them due to no place to ripen). Camembert and Brie for example. Lots of others. However, those are specific cultures that are safe if not merely benign for human consumption.

It's funny but who in their right mind ever thought to take something like moldy bread and "inoculate cheese" with it. Is this crazy mad scientist kind of stuff....and this was before we had these scientific test to determine what will or will not kill you.

https://curd-nerd.com/cultivate-your-own-blue-mold/

How To Make Penicillium Roqueforti Spores

It involves leaving a piece of sour dough bread with a pea sized piece of ripened blue cheese.
Leave the cheese and bread in an airtight container for two weeks.
Monitor the spread of the mold on the bread and flip it every couple of days.
Wipe off excess moisture from the container, to avoid the bread going soggy.
Once the growth of those special Penicillium Roqueforti spores, has consumed the bread in blueish-green mold the bread is ready to be dried.
Leave the container opened for a few days allowing the bread to dry. Ensuring to flip the bread so it fully dries.
Once fully dried, store in an air tight jar. The jar does not need to be refrigerated and the penicillium roqueforti spores will last for years.

gr8dlr wrote: ↑ It's funny but who in their right mind ever thought to take something like moldy bread and "inoculate cheese" with it. Is this crazy mad scientist kind of stuff....and this was before we had these scientific test to determine what will or will not kill you.

Probably trial and error of laymen through the centuries, informal unlike Alexander Fleming, and noticed that the blue safe-to-eat stuff protected the cheese against other nasty stuff. Lots of foods have to be cooked, cured or prepared in certain unusual or unexpected ways so they're not toxic (as in "how many people died before they figured that out?"). Can't name any off-hand.

nomdenet wrote: ↑ Cheese was outstanding!! Even had the thin oil? film on it. Was half expecting something to happen once the seal was broken. Perhaps the big concern is how long it lasts once you have opened it.

Glad you were open minded about eating it. Oil probably due to aging. It oozes out.

Everywhere I looked even down to the specific type of cheese suggests no longer than 12 months unopened sealed etc.

Lots of scare-dy cats who think the stuff goes bad. Lots of really old, aged cheese out there, that were aged w/o refrigeration or vacuum packaging. I remember the kids of my wife's friend asking their dad " will we die if we eat (barely post-dated stuff)?" I'd like to say to them, "that post-dated stuff will taste mighty good when you're hungry and there's nothing else to eat".

May help that I do keep the fridge quite cold to begin with.

Could be but cheese is aged in naturally cold, unrefrigerated cellars too. Wish I had one with space so I could experiment with cheese making (more than I already do).