Can I have Brie ???

[himynameiss]

4 weeks preggo. Found out yesterday evening after eating half a Brie triangle to myself. Now all I want is Brie. Brie. Brie. Brie. Someone tell me I can have it!

I've gone with @ItMustBeBedtimeSurely and I've been eating brie, camembert, blue cheese, salami......

the french do it! that's my excuse.

The last recorded cases of listeria have all been to do with salad.

Being pasteurised doesn’t make a difference with mould ripened cheese. It can only be eaten if cooked through.

All hard cheeses are ok, including unpasteurised and blue cheeses.

I have a very French attitude to eating in pregnancy, and regularly partake of deli meats etc. If you’re a cautious sort it’s prob best not to, but I’ve read up on the risks and they’re minuscule.

I am so, so sick of people parroting the myth the brie is safe if pasteurised. It is a fundamental misunderstanding of the guidance:

Soft cheeses with white rinds
Don't eat mould-ripened soft cheese (cheeses with a white rind) such as brie and camembert. This includes mould-ripened soft goats' cheese, such as chèvre. These cheeses are only safe to eat in pregnancy if they've been cooked.

Yes, the risk is very small and everyone needs to make their own informed decision but if someone is bothered enough to start a thread then they deserve to be given accurate information.

What Lisasimpsonsbff et al said. I'd add that 'cooked' means 'to the point of melting/bubbling', not 'vaguely warmed up'.

This was one thing on which I followed the guidance to the letter (incl washing salad etc thoroughly, avoiding bagged salad etc), as even if the risk is very small the consequences of listeriosis can be so severe and as it may be asymptomatic in you, there is no way of knowing until it's too late.

Just to explode one more myth - French women are given pretty much exactly the same advice as Britons, as per this public health booklet. The relevant passage is on p.26. If you don't read French it roughly translates as:

Forget certain foods for 9 months

...During your pregnancy, it is therefore recommended to avoid:

-cheeses with a soft mould-ripened rind (like camembert or brie) and with a washed rind (like munster or pont-l'évêque), especially if they are made from unpasteurised milk; industrial grated cheese. Remove the rind from all cheeses.