This trick for storing supermarket Parmesan or Grana Padano is genius
You can really do anything with Parmesan. It’s not for nothing that I almost always have a block in the fridge. Preferably, I buy it from the cheesemonger, but honestly: nine times out of ten, my Parmesan comes from the supermarket. Now I’ve found the ultimate trick for storing your Parmesan or Grana Padano.
This is truly a case of: why didn’t I know this sooner?!
Storing Parmesan: how should you do it?
Parmesan from the supermarket usually comes in a vacuum-packed ‘wedge’. If I explain it like that, I hope you immediately see what I mean. That tight plastic is, of course, there to keep it fresh. But once that plastic has been opened, I usually find it quite a hassle and don’t know what to do with it. Do I take the cheese out of the plastic and wrap it in aluminum foil? Leave it in the opened plastic and fold the plastic over in a rather pathetic way? Put the cheese in a container? You see: Parmesan makes me a little nervous. But when I saw this tip on Instagram, I was immediately intrigued. So this is how you’re supposed to store Parmesan.
The plastic packaging trick
Honestly: I was a little skeptical. ‘But this doesn’t fit at all?!’ was my first thought. But I tried it—the only way to find out—and it really works! When you use a block of Parmesan or Grana Padano, you always start at the bottom ‘point’. You cut off the piece of the block you need and then put the rest away. Whatever you do, don’t completely tear open the plastic packaging. Then it’s a lost cause. Instead, cut the piece of cheese off the block together with the plastic. You’ll see that you’re left with a kind of plastic cap. Slide that plastic cap over the exposed piece of cheese. That’s all. See, the answer was in the packaging itself all along!
Rind: don’t throw it away!
The larger the piece of cheese you cut off, the more room there is to fit it over the wider part of the cheese as well. But yes, usually you grab a shitload of Parmesan for your dish, so you need a fairly large piece. At least, if I can speak for myself. Have you made it all the way to the rind of the cheese? Don’t throw it away, because you can make an amazing snack with it. Look at us being so efficient with Italian cheese!
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