Cave
A cool, humid cellar or natural cavern where cheese is left to age.
Also: cheese cave, cellar, ageing room, cave d'affinage
A cheese cave is any space kept cool and damp enough for cheese to ripen slowly without drying out, usually around ten to fourteen degrees and very high humidity. Some are natural: the caves of Mont Combalou at Roquefort-sur-Soulzon are cooled by draughts through fissures called fleurines, and caves in Asturias age Cabrales. Others are old forts, tunnels or monastery cellars; Comté is aged in a nineteenth-century fort in the Jura. Most modern caves are built rooms with controlled air. Each cave has its own mix of moulds and bacteria on the walls and shelves, which settles on the cheese. Cheesemongers speak of a cheese's cave in the way wine merchants speak of a cellar.