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Everything You Need to Know About Meltkraft, Opening Next Week on Ninth Street
Thursday, August 29, 2025 at 8:23AM
Meltkraft, from the same folks that brought you the popular cheese shop Valley Shepherd Cheese on Seventh Avenue between Third and Fourth Streets, will be opening either next Tuesday or Wednesday in the space that was last occupied by Almondine Bakery, on Ninth Street just west of Seventh Avenue, owner/ cheesemaker Eran Wajswol told me. He also filled me in on what we can expect when it opens. In short: it looks awesome.
First of all, while it will be a grilled cheese-centric restaurant (very similar to the one in Philly's Reading Terminal Market), all the cheeses that are currently for sale at Valley Shepherd will also be on sale here. "The entire setup at the store is duplicated here," Wajswol said. Valley Shepherd is entirely veritcally integrated, making all the cheese themselves, and this is good cheese, purchased by some of the city's best restaurants.
Cheeses will arrive at both shops every few days "as cave releases dictate," according to Eran, and seasonal cheeses will be incorporated into weekly special grilled cheeses. Ten taps will dispense a weekly-rotating selection of local microbrews (available in pints, pitchers, growlers, and flights), wines will also be available, and in the mornings they'll be selling coffee from La Colombe and baked goods from Balthazar.
As for the permanent menu, Wajswol was kind enough to send that over too. And here it is (click for larger versions):
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These are some supremely creative and delicious sounding sandwiches, and yes, you read that right: you can choose whether you'd like your sandwich grilled in bacon fat or duck fat. This is going to be very good.
Meltkraft will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, and until midnight on Friday and Saturday. And here's a note from Eran:
"Why is a dairy farmer/cheesemaker opening restaurants?
I can tell you what drives this: we are milking close to 700 animals twice a day and making cheese 7 days a week. We age cheese from 3 to 24 months in a 120-foot cave blasted under the mountain. Farmstead cheese making is all about the passion. We do nothing but worry, panic, sweat, and ache to make milk and cheese that comes out perfectly. Then we’re happy for a minute.
We can’t and won’t work this hard to be under the thumb of distribution companies and retailers who want products to run cheese ”programs” to match their wine and beer “programs”. Our only “program” has 2 teats (sheep & goats) on it and needs to breed every November.
So, we disconnected ourselves from the American food distribution system and big retailers who put margin first and farmer second, move cheese around the country (and world) in refrigerated ships and trucks, and dictate to farmers what to make and when. We make what is seasonally correct when we feel it is right and sell it directly at the Green Markets, to a few great chefs, and at our owned retail locations in NY, NJ, and Philly’s Reading Terminal.
So enjoy the grillies and remember that about half of every bite goes to feed and manage dairy beasties. The rest goes to cheesemaking, employees, and our stores. Dairy farming never made anyone rich."
Coming Soon in Food, Scoops, Storefronts
Reader Comments (15)
Let's stop using the suffix "-centric" after every food-centric noun.
Guess they'll have to change their name, unless they're affiliated with the Kraft Foods Company, makers of non-artisanal cheese.
I would like to contribute in this place with my cheese and salami sandwiches,looks a wonderful place Bye from Italy and a good luck to everybody.
Actually the name is totally legal. They've also had a Meltkraft for years in Reading Terminal so if there were copyright issues it would have already come up.
This place will clean up. South slope rising.
Grilled in duck fat or bacon fat as options? I'm impressed.
Hungry.
No one else thinks these are expensive? This is GRILLED CHEESE after all.
These are pretty normal prices for sandwiches with quality ingredientd. If you bothered to read the menu you see most of the sandwiches are not just cheese, many have meat S well. . Moreover you can't compare processed cheese to the kind of cheese they're using. These aren't your moms Kraft single sammies
I was dubious at first but this looks really impressive. If they keep the beer prices reasonable this will be a great alternative to BareBurger for parents who need a drink.
"No one else thinks these are expensive? This is GRILLED CHEESE after all."
They're eight dollars. Come on, now. If you can't afford that, I heard the rent in Jersey's much cheaper.
I'd pay 5x that for a grilled cheese right now. So hungry. Which they'd deliver to TriBeCa... I can't wait to try it this weekend.
I think the prices are on the low side. When I learned that Valley Shepherd was gonna open a grilled cheese sandwich store in Park Slope I figured the prices would start at ten bucks or more.
My wife and I have made our own grilled cheese sammies using leftover Valley Shepherd cheese on Bread Alone organic peasant bread, and I can tell you they were TERRIFIC.
Valley Shepherd makes great cheeses, and we can't wait to try their grilled cheese offerings.
Finally checked this out (twice!) last weekend. It was amazing. Soooo good. And they sever beer on tap, so a beer and an amazing sandwich must have been around $15 or so, and easily worth it. Also, they sell day old bread for $1. Amazing! Going back for sure.
Eating there now, damn good.