A day in the life of a cheesemonger: How Ming made The Cheese Ark into Singapore’s artisan cheese haven
How many types of cheeses can you name off the top of your head? For most people, the list ends at parmesan, cheddar, or maybe brie.
But cheese is a delicacy that holds so much significance in so many different cultures, and involves such meticulous craftsmanship — something that The Cheese Ark endeavours to show Singapore’s foodies.
And it’s probably right to say those who love cheese, would know The Cheese Ark.
The beloved craft cheese shop has amassed a loyal cult-following since its early days at the now-defunct PasarBella at Grandstand, even after a move to its quieter new Queenstown spot in 2018.
Sadly, after a memorable 12 years, the owner has decided to call it quits — there isn’t a firm final day, but owner Ming says Jan of 2026 will be its last month.
When the shop is all out of cheese, it’s goodbye.
Before we bid farewell to the beloved brand, we take a dive into what its cheesemonger’s day looks like.
How one becomes a cheesemonger
First and foremost, The Cheese Ark is more than just a cheese shop: It’s a passion project and product of love by owner 54-year-old Ai Ming Syu.
Ming, as she is more commonly known as, is the heart and soul of the shop, with everything going through her.
As someone who has spent much of her time in the mountains and farms of Europe, Ming can possibly be described as a bastion of cheese wisdom — perhaps one of the most knowledgeable in Singapore.
She did not technically receive a formal education in cheesemongering, per se, but in her own words, she “escaped” her corporate job to work on farms every chance she got.
She learned a lot from farm life, including learning to approach nature and farming in a more respectful way.
Her first farm stint was in Tuscany, under a man named Claudio — she can’t recall the exact year anymore, but it’s way before The Cheese Ark came into existence.
Even then, she still remembers Claudio: “He was instrumental in teaching me how to make cheese, and a respect for nature — all the rudimentary laws of nature.”
“That was what introduced the ‘germ’ that developed the perspectives I hold today.”
Even then, though, she never envisioned herself opening a cheese shop in Singapore.
To be fair — how many people would?
That is, until she saw an ad looking for people to open one of Singapore’s first few proper fromageries at PasarBella.
For someone who deeply respects produce and noticed the gap in our understanding of cheese, she felt like it was a challenge worth taking up.
“Not to pat myself on the back, but I thought: ‘If that’s what Singapore wants, I’m one of the people best positioned for the job,’” she says.
The cheesemonger’s job
So what does running The Cheese Ark look like?
Ming comes in around 11am, just a bit before The Cheese Ark’s opening time, and the first thing she does is check in on the cheeses in her cellar.
Ming isn’t just a cheesemonger, but also an affineur — one of her main responsibilities is ensuring the smooth aging of the cheeses.
She not only curates the best cheeses for customers at The Cheese Ark, but also devotes herself to affinage, which is the art of aging cheese to enhance characteristics such as flavour and texture.
In fact, it is precisely Ming’s fastidious approach to aging cheese that makes The Cheese Ark stand out amongst its peers in Singapore.
Some unique and memorable cheeses include the Moncenisio X, a blue cheese that Ming ages with port wine in preparation for the festive season, and the rosemary Quadrello, a buffalo milk cheese she personally ages with rosemary!
One fascinating fixture of The Cheese Ark is its custom-made cheese aging cellar, which took quite a bit of trouble to get right — since no one in Singapore had any real experience setting one up.
“A huge part of what we do here is affinage (the process of aging cheese),” she says. “As they age, I have to check in on them everyday.”
Says Ming: “Some of them need less attention, while some of them have ‘mood issues’. You have to do a lot of things on a daily basis, including turning and washing them. There’s a lot of moving cheese about!”
“Basically, it’s a small space, so you can only move it to a lower or higher shelf within the cellar. But what you’re chasing with these tweaks is humidity and temperature,” she adds.
She likens it to taking care of plants — how cute!
After checking on her precious babies, she moves onto tasks such as carving up cheese and preparing them for sale.
During our visit, we got to witness Ming in action, taking out a hay-crusted wheel of cheese, carefully unwrapping it and setting it on the table.
One by one, she impales the wheel of cheese with knives until it cracks open.
She then brushes off excess hay and lets us take a whiff. Fresh and grassy, mmm.
Not long after, we got to see yet another facet of her cheesemonger life — assembling cheese platters.
Ming carefully slices up the chunks of cheese and puts them in a box to go, but not before exchanging pleasantries with a Cheese Ark regular, who’d come in looking for one of its prized platters.
Beyond the cheese itself, “omakase” cheeseboards are another big draw at this fromagerie, with many regulars looking for carefully curated and artfully plated collections of cheese, nuts and fruit for their soirees.
Some even come just to indulge at the shop itself, sometimes pairing the cheeseboards with the eclectic range of wines and sakes Ming keeps on hand.
Choosing the right cheese
Beyond the day-to-day, though, being a cheesemonger is also about choosing the best cheese.
The thing about Ming, though, is that she doesn’t merely sell cheese. The reason why The Cheese Ark is so well loved is her working knowledge of the farms and a deep understanding of the craft — of how milk changes, how seasonality affects the cheese, and many other things.
If you were to talk to her about it though, she’d say it’s about being in constant conversation with the cheesemakers.
She recalls: “Just a while ago, one of the cheese makers was on the phone with me, at God-knows-what time in Switzerland, excitedly telling me about the cheese he’s preparing for me.”
While curating the inventory is the cheesemonger’s job, we’re also quite curious about what it takes to assemble one’s own cheeseboard.
Ming explains her approach: “There’s no real point in having cheeses that have the same kind of style or profile. You wouldn’t have both a brie and a camembert on the same platter, even if you like both.”
She likes the idea of exploring interesting flavours on the board, including the accompaniments. You’ll see an interesting array of bites alongside your cheeses at The Cheese Ark, including dried mangoes.
Why? These are all things Ming likes herself. Ultimately, it’s “to each their own”, she says.
But you also have to take the texture into consideration — for example, you may not want to make a hard cheese even drier — unless you’re English and have a penchant for crackers and cheese.
She says: “I think people should just be really experimental with food in general!”
The Cheese Ark omakase cheeseboard
Any fan of The Cheese Ark would rave about its omakase-style cheeseboards (prices vary).
In essence, it’s crafted as a sequence of eight different cheeses meant to be eaten one after another.
On top of that, you are also provided with accoutrements, ranging from crackers to walnuts, to nibble at in between bites of cheese.
Since it’s omakase-style — where the chef chooses what you eat — you can’t always guarantee what goes on the board. But rest assured, as Ming always has good stuff prepared.
For example, there’s the exquisite Belper Knolle Jung (S$22.50 per piece) from Switzerland. Beyond its home country, Singapore is the only other country where it can be found!
This young Belper Knolle is crusted with pepper and exudes the most gratifying pepper fragrance — it’s elegant, balmy, floral, and not at all astringent.
Then, there are the sublime tomato and basil La Bousse (S$3.95 for 36g) and chilli La Bousse (S$3.30 for 30g) that come from the same cheesemaker in the Netherlands.
Each piece is creamy as heck, and the flavours come through so sublimely.
The chilli la bousse is fragrantly umami with a mild heat, whereas the tomato and basil variation is rich with a pleasant twinge of earthiness.
Remember the hay-crusted cheese from earlier? We got to taste it as part of our cheeseboard, too!
The Malga Affinato Fieno (S$2.90 for 24g) is the penultimate cheese of the eight and is lush with a strong fruitiness and acidity, with a touch of grassiness in the finish.
Talk about fascinating cheeses: You probably won’t find anything like this outside of The Cheese Ark, perhaps even at the poshest restaurants in town.
Back to the farms
The Cheese Ark’s days are numbered and it’s probably time to pay a visit, if you’re a cheese-lover who has never been, or just someone who hasn’t returned in a while.
As far as F&B closures in Singapore go, though, this one is less bitter, more sweet.
It’s not due to operational or rental issues, as with many such closures — it’s actually been the plan all along.
“When I first opened The Cheese Ark, it was an interjection to my original trajectory, which was to work in the farms as much as I can,” Ming explains, pensively.
“From day one, I already decided on 10 years for the shop, because you can’t truly say you built something unless it’s gone on for X number of years. But we’ve already gone past that point, into 12 years.”
If anything, this should be seen as a happy moment for Ming and The Cheese Ark — she closes this chapter of her life triumphantly, having built one of Singapore’s most beloved cheese shops.
What’s next for her? First and foremost, making sure everything is perfect for the final days of the shop so her customers can relish the rest of their time with The Cheese Ark.
Undoubtedly, the customers are one of the things she’ll miss the most: “The magic about the shop, over and beyond what we do and sell, is how it draws in a unique set of customers who are really open to what I do, and you build up certain friendships over the years.”
After that, Ming will “escape” to the mountains once again — this time to try her hand at shepherding.
“It sounds odd to say, but from day one of the shop, I’ve been waiting for this day to come so I can return to what I really want to do,” she muses.
All good things come to an end, but The Cheese Ark will always live in our hearts.
To end it off, we have some heartfelt words from Ming: “Selling cheese in Singapore is not the easiest thing to do and for us to achieve what we’ve achieved, it’s a privilege.”
“I hope everybody can say that they had a great experience and we had opened their eyes to cheese, and what’s possible within cheese.”
P.S. If you’re visiting, as per tradition, The Cheese Ark will stop dine-in and cheese boxes after Dec 14 due to its hectic schedule!
This was a hosted tasting.
For more ideas on what to eat, read our review of the Kin Hoi’s 500g cockle platter, or our visit to Woody Family Peranakan Cafe in Sembawang.
Thurs 12pm - 9pm
Fri 12pm - 9pm
Sat 11am - 9pm
Sun 12pm - 6pm
- Queenstown
Evan started off writing about food on Instagram, before joining outlets such as Buro and Confirm Good to pursue his passion. His best work usually comes after his first whisky shot in the morning.
Read more stories from this writer.
