Last month, Counter Cheesemongers, owned by Eric Casella and Nora Granger, opened a small storefront at 3973 Rivers Ave., Suite 105. The cheesemongers had been operating their wholesale business out of the space since 2018, so the addition of a cheese counter and retail store made sense.
The store, which sells cheese, sandwiches and locally sourced items including beer and wine, is open from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. You can still find Counter Cheesemongers at local farmers markets, including the popular Sea Island farmers market on Johns Island.
“We work with a bunch of different small cheese makers from around the country, with a focus on the Southeast,” Granger said. “We don’t have anything from Vermont or California or the big names that you see everywhere. It’s just much smaller producers that you’re not gonna really find other places.”
Casella added that they work hard to represent all cheese types, including sheep’s milk, which is produced in very limited quantities around the country. “It’s constant open communication with [producers] which is really cool … because we get to see how they grow and what they are dipping their toes into,” he said. Needless to say there may be some bottled sheep’s milk available for purchase at Counter Cheesemonger’s soon.
Cheese on the brain
Both Casella and Granger come from a cheese and retail background, working for several years at Murray’s Cheese in New York City, which Granger described as a sort of “cheese graduate school.”
Bon Appetit declared Murray’s “the best cheese selection in New York City, and really, the whole dang country. Murray’s is a dairy mecca, no question.”
“I don’t think there’s a faster-paced retail cheese counter environment like that in the United States,” said Casella, who focused on the affinage, or aging aspect of cheese, while Granger focused on management, retail and wholesale. The pair managed other cheese shops in New York before deciding to make the move south.
“It’s such a good food scene,” Granger said of Charleston. Counter Cheesemongers supply the cheese for local spots like Stems & Skins, Herd Provisions, Husk, Obstinate Daughter and more. You can order cheese from the shop online at countercheesemongers.com, or stop by the store on Fridays and Saturdays to get a rundown of offerings from the cheesemongers themselves.
“We’re usually here all day anyway,” Granger said of Counter Cheesemongers’ headquarters. “So we’re like, why not sell some cheese while we’re at it?”
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