Does it get moldy?
When it smells like Lavender !
Lavender cheese? Hmm. ...... No!
When it becomes sentient, grows a goatee and starts its own religious cult in your kitchen and ends when it makes everyone drink poisoned koolaid.
Different blue cheeses have different death days. Usually gone bad when the characteristics of that cheese are no longer there. e.g. instead of creamy it goes more firm and then brittle.
Some you can't tell. Like below someone posted about Danish Blue, I love blue cheeses but cannot go near Danish but my ex girlfriend loved it. To me it was eye watering ammonia.
I live a few miles from a town called Melton Mowbray where they make a famous blue cheese called Stilton. It is lovely and comes in different ages and strengths. The French and Italians also make delicious blue cheese and also some horrendous nightmares. One of which I came across in a Paris cheese shop that had its own separate sealed store box that had live maggots running through it.
Brilliant response. I learned something even...thank you!
I always find it amusing that blue cheese made in the town of Stilton cannot be called Stilton. I also like Stichelton - the traditionally made Stilton? [slowfood.com]
I love potted Stilton that has been drip fed with port for a month.
Have you tried Bavarian blu cheese. Like Stilton, it too is superbly creamy.
That one is way over my head. We eat velveeta over here.
Yikes! That's not cheese! Run away!
@Freespirit64 I wouldn't know a fine unless you told me it was...lol. our mac and cheese dishes are simple and cheap. My wife likes her wine and cheese and crackers. I don't like her wine! Yuck! And its supposed to be the good stuff. I guess I was raised on the cheap stuff and thought it was good. They gave us cheese in big blocks of it. That's what we were raised on. Yep ... no silver spoon in my mouth!
@BucketlistBob I understand...but don't you think that's a bit on the line of "I believe in god cause that's how I was raised"? Broaden your horizons man!
Bob, their talking about food not Velveeta.
@Freespirit64 if you want to talk about God then that's a whole new discussion with me. Cheese has no horizon with me. It hasn't caused me any harm. The same as wine... I like the cheap, sweet wine. I like chicken legs and thighs instead of the breast. I like shrimp over lobster. BTW...I did believe in God God because that's how I was raised. I also discovered the harm and pain that came in this belief. I changed because it was a lie that controlled people. Now cheese...lol. its just a matter of taste... it ain't hurting anybody . The same as my cheap coffee compared to Starbucks. It's a matter of taste and money....lol. I can settle for cheap cheese over an expensive one with a different taste.... well I rambled enough...lol.
@patchoullijulie but velveeta is food to me...lol.
@BucketlistBob Hey food or not I love Velveeta. Velveeta, salsa and chips = gourmet food!
@patchoullijulie yummm.... the wife loves it. If I'm not careful, she'll eat all of it herself...lol.
@Freespirit64 Cheesus Christ! Take it easy.
It becomes green cheese lol. Really though, it's the smell, bad blue cheese smells acrid like hair dye.
When it starts bringing home D's and F's on its report card, and you find cigarettes hidden it's room!!!
My chef instructor always insisted that fat, and cheese is a kind of "fat", always freezes well, (he would always say) if you buy an expensive blue cheese, or any other cheese for that matter, and you can't or don't finish it, freeze the rest of it until you intend to use it, then take it out of the freezer and out of the freezer bag and set it on the counter to thaw and to come to room temperature, it will also dry the condensation off of it, cheese is best eaten at room temperature.
Finger foods like cheese are best eaten at room temperature; however, melted cheeses and cheeses in fondues are also very tasty too.
And if your cheese is growing an uneatable culture, cut around the "furry" spot by at least a Half of an inch, then eat the rest, you won't get sick, we do it all the time at the restaurant s
The cheese wrind can also be a great place to breed colonies of good bacteria and or fungus, if the wrind on your cheese is aunatural, eat it, use it it in soups, as long as it's not plastic like the "Laughing Cow"
If it turns green, or says hello when you open the fridge, you might have reason to be concerned. I once found an onion trying to squeeze the life out of a mustard bottle once... Keep your eyes and ears open!
I cannot believe all the interest your question has garnered. Cheeses! Whey all the interest when there are perfectly good cheeses to talk about? Point of interest, Parmesan cheese smells like dirty feet because both contain the same bacteria. Doesn't that make you chedder. Cheesy, I know.
All matured cheese, not just "blue cheese" is technically "bad" in that it has been modified by bacteria or fungi. (Beer is bad, by the way.)
Blue cheese is merely a different mould, that is manually inserted using copper probes. Provided it has only been affected by the approved "bugs", it is fine, but it certainly becomes more and more overpowering with time. However, if cheese, of any colour, becomes attacked by moulds that start to produce "fur" on the surface of the cheese, then it has indeed gone bad.
Wow cheese expert among us. Petter you've been hiding your talents.
@sassygirl3869 There are laws against showing my finest talent in public
I'm actually an ever curious nerd - it comes with the "asparagus" territory.
I don't like the phrases that beer and cheese (and wine) are "bad" their tastes have been modified by active molds and bacteria which changed and even improved their tastes... impressively.... for the better of everyone's enjoyment.
@michaelcancook Also blue cheese, of course. But since the post was asking about knowing when blue cheese had gone bad ......
@Petter That's why I said that (leftover) cheese can be frozen, cheese never has to go bad if you do this, however if you have cheese that has slime------"pitch it out"
@Petter If the cheese is harder and more brittle, that's because it's lost moisture, the lack of water doesn't mean the cheese is "bad," just use it differently, like put it in soup, or a sauce, or a fondue.
@michaelcancook Hard cheese, preferably not blue, grates well and I use it for pasta dishes when I want a break from Parmigiano.