The Cheese Shop
Carmel Plaza, Ocean Avenue and Junipero Street, Carmel, (831) 625‑2272, thecheeseshopinc.com
Imagine that John Steinbeck was with us today and happened to be a scribe at a local weekly newspaper. Now imagine that his editors tasked him with explaining The Cheese Shop as Best Cheese Selection in Monterey County. We’re guessing he would lose all his eloquence and simply write “No, duh!” – leaving his editors to fill out the rest. This is because it goes without saying that The Cheese Shop is the best, with hundreds of the world’s finest cheeses, a staff well versed in curds to guide you through them, samples to introduce you to cheeses you’ve never tried before and the impossibility of leaving without just one offering. But there’s more – wines, crackers, bread, artisanal treasures and such. So we’re with our imaginary modern and quite terse Steinbeck: No, duh.