Can I eat goat cheese while pregnant?

The verdict

Goat's milk is not the problem, and that surprises most people. The NHS puts goats' cheese that does not have a white coating on the outside on its list of pasteurised soft cheeses that are safe to eat in pregnancy, in the same line as cottage cheese, cream cheese, mozzarella, feta, paneer, ricotta, mascarpone, halloumi and burrata.

The cheese that needs cooking is the rinded one. The NHS names soft ripened goats' cheese with a white coating on the outside in its foods to be careful with, and says foods made from unpasteurised milk, including that cheese, must be thoroughly cooked. The same instruction covers chevre and any other mould-ripened goat's cheese log or round.

So the question to ask in the chiller is not what animal the milk came from. It is whether the cheese has a rind, and whether the label says pasteurised.

Why the rind changes the answer

A soft rindless goat's cheese is a fresh acid-set curd: made quickly, drained, salted, and eaten young. It is sharply acidic, and acidity suppresses listeria.

A rinded goat's cheese is a different food that happens to share an ingredient. Mould is applied to the surface, and as it grows it consumes the lactic acid and drives the pH of the cheese upward, softening the paste from the outside in. That is what makes a ripe chevre creamy under the skin, and it is also what turns a hostile environment into a comfortable one. The Food Standards Agency lists soft mould-ripened cheeses among the ready-to-eat foods in which listeria is more commonly found.

Listeria's other trick is growing in the cold. That is why the FSA advises chilling food below 5C, eating ready-to-eat food within four hours of taking it out of the fridge, and never eating past the use-by date: refrigeration slows this organism but does not stop it.

Which goat's cheeses have a rind

Rindless, and on the NHS safe list if pasteurised: soft goat's curd in a tub, spreadable goat's cheese, goat's cream cheese, crumbly rindless logs sold in plastic, and goat's feta-style cheese in brine.

Rinded, and to be cooked: chevre logs and buttons with a white bloomy coating, ash-coated goat's cheeses, and any goat's cheese with a wrinkled or fuzzy skin. Aged hard goat's cheeses, such as an aged gouda-style or a hard tomme, behave like other hard cheeses; the NHS lists pasteurised or unpasteurised hard cheeses as safe.

Goat's cheese on a pizza, in a salad, on a tart

This is where most of the real-world questions land, and heat answers nearly all of them.

A rinded goat's cheese round baked on top of a pizza or a tart until it is bubbling has been cooked, and the NHS lists any cheese that has been cooked until steaming hot, including soft or blue cheese, as safe. A goat's cheese and beetroot salad, where a cold slice is laid on leaves, has not been cooked, and if the cheese is rinded it falls under the instruction to cook it.

Grilled goat's cheese on a crouton counts as cooked if it has actually been under the grill until molten, and does not if it was warmed for thirty seconds to soften it. The FSA makes the equivalent point about smoked fish added to hot dishes: warming something through while you prepare a meal does not reach a temperature that kills listeria.

Where Australia draws the line differently

Food Standards Australia New Zealand does not split rinded from rindless. Its higher-risk table for pregnant women, older people and immunocompromised people covers soft, semi-soft and surface-ripened cheeses as a single row, and the examples it gives are brie, camembert, mozzarella, ricotta, feta and blue. The safer alternatives are hard cheeses, pasteurised cream cheese, plain cottage cheese and baked soft cheeses cooked to an internal temperature of 75C.

A soft goat's cheese, rinded or not, is a soft cheese, so under Australian and New Zealand advice the cooked route is the recommended one. This is the same disagreement that applies to feta and mozzarella, and it is a difference of classification rather than of underlying science.

Ireland's HSE names mould-ripened cheeses such as brie and camembert on its avoid list, which covers rinded chevre by description, and does not restrict rindless pasteurised goat's cheese.

Unpasteurised goat's cheese

Raw goat's milk cheese is common at farmers' markets and farm shops, and it is the one category where every country agrees. The NHS lists unpasteurised milk, cream, yoghurt, butter and ice cream among foods to avoid, and says foods made from unpasteurised milk, such as soft ripened goats' cheese with a white coating, must be thoroughly cooked. The FDA and ACOG both say avoid cheeses made with unpasteurised milk. FSANZ lists unpasteurised dairy as higher risk with pasteurised dairy as the alternative.

The FSA's raw drinking milk guidance exists because raw milk can carry organisms including listeria, salmonella, E. coli and campylobacter, and because there is no processing step afterwards to remove them. In a cheese made from that milk, cooking is the only reliable fix.

If you have already eaten some

Cold rinded goat's cheese, once, is a small risk rather than a serious event. Listeriosis is uncommon, and NHS advice on foods that should have been avoided is that a small amount, if you did not become ill, is unlikely to affect your baby.

Because the incubation can be long, what matters is the following weeks. ACOG notes symptoms may appear as late as two months afterwards, and lists fever, chills, muscle aches, diarrhoea or upset stomach, and in more serious illness a stiff neck, headache, confusion or loss of balance. If any of those appear, contact your midwife or GP the same day and tell them what you ate. Listeriosis is treated with antibiotics, and treating it promptly is what protects the pregnancy.

Where guidance genuinely differs

The UK draws its line at the rind and says so in plain words. Ireland draws it at mould-ripened cheese and does not offer a cooking route on the page. Australia and New Zealand draw it around soft cheese as a category and specify 75C for the cooked alternative. The US draws it at pasteurisation, so a pasteurised soft goat's cheese, rinded or not, is not on the FDA or ACOG avoid list.

All four converge on two things: raw-milk goat's cheese is out unless cooked, and thoroughly cooked goat's cheese is fine. If you want one rule that satisfies every authority, bake it.