Brie is not considered safe to eat cold during pregnancy, even when made from pasteurized milk. The CDC lists brie as a riskier food choice for pregnant women and recommends that soft cheeses like brie only be eaten after heating to an internal temperature of 165°F (74°C) or until steaming hot. The concern is a bacterium called Listeria, which thrives in the moist environment of soft-ripened cheeses and poses serious risks to a developing pregnancy.
Why Brie Carries Risk During Pregnancy
Listeria is unlike most foodborne bacteria because it can grow at refrigerator temperatures. That means a contaminated cheese sitting in your fridge doesn’t just stay the same level of dangerous; it can actually become more so over time. Soft-ripened cheeses like brie and camembert are particularly hospitable to Listeria because of their high moisture content, which gives the bacteria an ideal surface to colonize.
Contamination can happen during the cheesemaking process itself, but it can also occur afterward, during handling, packaging, or aging. This is why even brie made from pasteurized milk isn’t automatically safe. The CDC has documented outbreaks linked to pasteurized soft cheeses produced in facilities with improper processing conditions. Pasteurization eliminates bacteria in the milk, but it can’t protect against contamination that happens later in production.
Why Pregnant Women Are Especially Vulnerable
Pregnancy alters the immune system in ways that make it harder to fight off certain infections. Pregnant women are roughly 10 times more likely to develop listeriosis than other healthy adults, according to the FDA. For most people, a Listeria exposure might cause a brief bout of diarrhea. In pregnancy, the consequences can be far more severe.
The tricky part is that symptoms in the pregnant person are often mild: a low fever, muscle aches, fatigue. Some women never develop symptoms at all. But the infection can still cross the placenta and reach the baby. Listeriosis during pregnancy results in fetal loss in about 20 percent of cases and newborn death in about 3 percent. It can also trigger premature delivery or life-threatening infection in the newborn.
Symptoms of the more serious invasive form of listeriosis typically appear within two weeks of eating contaminated food, though intestinal symptoms can show up within 24 hours and usually resolve in one to three days. That gap between a mild illness in the mother and a severe outcome for the baby is what makes Listeria so dangerous during pregnancy.
Heated Brie Is a Safer Choice
If you’re craving brie, cooking it thoroughly is the simplest way to reduce the risk. Heat kills Listeria effectively. The target is an internal temperature of 165°F (74°C), which is the same temperature recommended for reheating leftovers. Melted brie on a sandwich, baked brie, or brie on pizza all qualify, as long as the cheese is steaming hot all the way through, not just warm on the surface.
This applies to all soft cheeses, not just brie. Camembert, blue-veined cheeses, and fresh Hispanic-style cheeses like queso fresco all fall into the same risk category. The CDC specifically lists heated pasteurized soft cheese as the safer alternative to eating these cheeses cold.
How to Check the Label
U.S. federal regulations require every ingredient in cheese to be declared on the label, including whether the milk is pasteurized. Most commercial brie sold in American grocery stores uses pasteurized milk, and the label will say so. If brie is made from unpasteurized (raw) milk, the cheese must be aged for at least 60 days at 35°F or higher before it can be sold in the U.S. True French brie, which is traditionally made from raw milk and aged for a shorter period, is not legally sold in the country, though it may appear at specialty shops or be brought back from travel.
A few practical rules help: always read the label and confirm the milk is pasteurized. Avoid imported or artisanal soft cheeses that don’t clearly state pasteurization on the packaging. And regardless of pasteurization status, heat any soft cheese to steaming before eating it. That last step is the one the CDC emphasizes most, because it addresses contamination that can happen after pasteurization.
Cheeses That Are Lower Risk
Hard and semi-hard cheeses are generally safer options during pregnancy because their low moisture content makes them much less hospitable to Listeria. Cheddar, Swiss, Parmesan, and Gouda are all lower-risk choices. Processed cheeses and cheese spreads also pose minimal risk because they undergo additional heat treatment during manufacturing.
If you want the experience of a soft, creamy cheese without the worry, cream cheese and cottage cheese made from pasteurized milk are also considered safer, since they’re produced and packaged differently than surface-ripened cheeses like brie. The key distinction is between soft-ripened or mold-ripened cheeses (brie, camembert, blue cheese) and other soft cheeses that don’t go through the same aging process.