Puhoi Valley Cheese

Wow!!! This Swiss girl raised in the Midwest of USA though she knew cheese before showing up here. What a fabulous selection and gracious staff to provide samples. We could not leave empty handed.

Puhoi Valley Cheese is a great place to visit, and not just for the amazing cheese. With a playground, beuatiful green lawns and a pond with a fountain, it is a great place to stop for lunch and a picnic. Puhoi Valley Cheese provides everything you need, blankets, baskets, and all the delicious food and drinks to go inside. You can taste all the cheeses before you buy and then create a picnic basket to enjoy. They also have platters, sandwiches and other lunch fare as well as the GREATEST ice cream. I now stop there just for the ice cream, it’s that good. If you are coming or going North of Auckland it’s just a short 5 minute detour from the motorway and it is definitely worth a visit.

Puhoi valley is an awesome little gem far away from the main main road. That being said, I’ve only been here twice and the first time I went there I had a cheese board with a nice little soda on the aside.
The cheese is amazing and you can tell that this place is proud of the way they make their cheese and how well their cheese turned out. You can see the cheese room which states «do not enter as you will disturb the cheese and wake them up» which I found delightful as I giggle to myself (awkward trust me I KNOW, but I bet you secretly do that too, please tell me I’m not the only one !)
Anyways, we decided to order some lunch off the menu, we got a fondue like order and in all honesty I felt that the cheese fondue lacked so much flavor. Maybe to someone who loves strong cheese, but to those who loves the simplicity of just good old cheese fondue then man will this knock your socks off !! You can smell a blue cheese smell as soon as you open the little lid ! if only we had smell vision :)
The other things we had was grilled cheese sandwiches which was not too bad, but I still felt lacking flavor.
Now how can you mess up good old chips (or fries as I call it sorry Nz I’m not so British) the hand cut fries were alright but the spotlight goes to the aioli ! It tastes kinda like fish… Maybe it was just me but it tasted a bit odd. (Sorry guys, it’s the truth !)
We left disappointed but knew what to do next time :)
So key points to understand is
— have coffee here ! It’s amazing, take pictures, have an awesome time
— have a cheese platter, it’s a lot more worth while !
— take photos and laugh awkwardly by yourself at funny little signs
Go and explore Auckland ! The world is your playground so why not start at the heart :)
Over and out

Something was terribly wrong when we visited Puhoi Cheese over the Xmas/​New Years holiday.
Busy as usual on a bright sunny summer day. Service was non existent, tables were uncleared and the empty ones outside were littered with bird excrement.
The food wasn’t much better, if, at all.
The «Mac n Cheese» was made from their vintage cheddar, but made with that only and penne pasta noodles. It was served to us with a deep pool of grease on top from the melted cheese. We quickly used our napkins to absorb this unwanted mess and couldn’t stomach more than a third of the entire dish.
You would assume a business whom specialises in (and produces) artisan cheeses would know how to make a decent fondue. Sadly, this was not the case during our visit. Lumpy off cuts of various cheeses were plainly visible, and the same unappetising thick layer of grease covered the tiny crock pot (not served on a heat source may I add). Gross. Just gross. 4 small slices of a plain white supermarket type baguette was served alongside with a few sparse sticks of carrot and red capsicum for an additional $ 3 (dish total $ 19.50).
We would of happily informed a server of our disappointments but sadly, no one ever checked on us to see how our meals were.
Blech.

An amazing café/​cheese shop that offers everything dairy. Thank you to the friend that drove us up all the way and recommending it. Unsure how I have gone without hearing of it before!
Tried their interesting combined– Fig and blue cheese ice cream with their rich chocolate as one scoop but getting half of each. Awesome they do that. They had other interesting flavours as well as award winning ones. Friend said their hokey pokey was a nice one– keen to try it later.
An extensive menu with cabinet things also. Tried their kid-​size mac and cheese which was heated with a side of salad with crumbled cheese and their own chutney. Would love to try something off their café menu next time for sure. Recommend their flat white– yum.
In a fridge, they have small triangles of soft cheeses as well as variety of non-​mainstream ones like gouda, homemade chutneys on a shelf nearby as well as other treats.
Indoors they have tables of all sorts of sizes near the till, ice cream and cheese stall as well a connecting room where you can admire the huge wheels and blocks of their cheese in the fridge room sitting and hanging off the shelves. Enjoyed reading how the different cheese were made on displays on the wall and looking at the bright yellow and orange of some cheeses.
They have a spacious outdoor veranda that sits in the valley with a next door water feature. Perfect for summer, especially all the green grass, with a small playground for kids and lots of trees to look out onto.
Such a cool place– definitely recommend a visit!

There is something magical about a factory shop. Especially if it’s a factory that makes cheese, yogurt and ice cream.
Puhoi valley cheese was fully packed today at 1pm. So I just ordered some award winning ice creams and some coffee. The ice cream is fantastic, so creamy and yummy. Same thing can’t be said about the coffee, it was almost as weak as water.
I m not a big cheese person, but I can’t resist a bargain. So I bought the single cream Camembert that is on special.
If it wasn’t pouring down outside, I would take a stroll around the grounds and maybe even had a play on the swings to work off those guilty ice cream calories.

Amazing :) Great ice-​cream and coffee. As well as excellent cheeses ;)
This is a great relaxing place to chill on the weekend, great scenery and good food, although the food could be better, the great coffee and gelato definitely outweigh this

I am a huge fan of the Puhoi single cream brie, and double cream Camembert, just delightful creamy sensations.
I was even more delighted to learn that the Puhoi Valley Cheese Factory and Café were located not so far away from where I live too.
Have had a couple lunch excursions here, and been very pleased with my meals, coffee, and the whole package of seeing where Puhoi cheese is produced.
You can grab an ice cream, and even some Puhoi made cheese for sale.
I enjoy relaxing here while sipping a glass of wine on the deck overlooking the beautiful scenery.
They also have a cute little playground for the kids to run around in, and stunning grounds.

The cheese that comes out of Puhoi is award winning and being the cheese glutton that I am I was pretty excited to visit the cheese cellar. The cellar is right next to the factory, and from it you get a peek through to the inner workings. I was in cheese heaven; surrounded by all their famous varieties, the blue is my favourite so I stocked up on that. I couldn’t work out whether it was cheaper than the supermarket but it’s worth stopping by just for the sheer selection. There’s also a café onsite; set in leafy surroundings. They have a large outdoor area for enjoying your cheese or coffee, or one of their many cakes. They also have a lunch menu with all the usual café fare.