For the past two decades, Murray’s Cheese has been Manhattan’s cheese tastemaker. From a small Greenwich Village store, cheesemongers enlighten New Yorkers on terroirs and washed rinds and supply upscale restaurants with camembert and French triple crèmes. Since 2008, Murray’s influence has spread across the country. Now fully owned by Kroger, the nation’s largest supermarket chain, Murray’s Cheese has over 750 locations across more than 30 states. The name Murray has become to specialty cheese what Nathan is to hotdogs — a New York Jew turned name brand.
I’d gone to the Bleecker Street shop for years without realizing that Murray’s Cheese had gotten bigger than Chuck E. Cheese. Like most New Yorkers, I knew it was a classic Village shop, but not much else. A counter man once told me that the store was founded in 1940 by a certain Murray Greenberg. Then I stumbled on the store’s About page and was shocked to read, “Murray Greenberg was a Jewish veteran of the Spanish Civil War.”