Turophiles of Memphis, your people have arrived. You’ll find them at Greys Fine Cheese and Entertaining, which opened May 18 in Williamsburg Village Shopping Center.

I went for lunch on Tuesday, eager to be among the first on opening day to sample the fare. I told co-owner Kurt Mullican, who’s in charge of the cheeses, to decide what I should order.

To his great credit, he didn’t make choices willy-nilly, or push the selected items for the day’s cheese board. Instead we talked about what he had, what I liked, what I’d already tried. Then he did his thing, mixing up some of the cheeses of the day with some others to replace those I already knew.

Judging at Memphis in May takes devotion and education

And let’s be clear, I know more than a little about cheese. Let me also be clear that I’m eager to learn more, now that a true cheese shop is back in town. Mullican not only knows more than I do, but he and co-owner Jackie Mau take their work so seriously that they’ve traveled to some of the farms where the dairy cows live to be sure they’re enjoying a good life.

Happy cows mean people care. If they care about the cows, they care about the cheese.

So here’s what we ate: A charcuterie plate ($16.99), prepared in-house with meats from Jimmy Gentry, who does a fabulous job. A five-cheese flight ($25.99) designed by Mullican after consultation. (It got pretty busy, and he wouldn’t have been able to spend that 20 minutes with me if I’d arrived an hour later.) And a small plate ($8.99) from the kitchen that featured an excellent marinated Australian feta made of sheep and goat milk, served with house-made arugula and walnut pesto and confit tomatoes.

Servings are generous; I have the rare to-go box in my fridge right now as there was no way I was leaving anything behind.

We ate the cheeses in this order, building in depth and intensity:

First, Leonora, a savory goat cheese from Spain. It’s creamy and fresh, with grassy notes typical in goat cheese, but smoother and less tangy. When I tasted it, I thought it would be my favorite cheese.

Next we ate a manchego from Spain, a sheep’s milk cheese that was fine, absolutely fine, but it was up against some crazy good cheeses and seemed ordinary in comparison.

Fourmage was our third cheese, and it was extraordinary. Never mind the name; pay it no attention. It’s a hokey play on fromage and so named because it’s made from the milk of cows, sheep, goats and water buffalo. It has small crystals, which I love, but a creamy texture from the water buffalo, a bit of tangy zip from the goat, some sweetness from the sheep. Possibly my favorite cheese we tried.

But following that (which my lunch companion said was the best cheese she’d ever eaten), we ate L’amuse Signature Gouda. Stellar. In fact, it’s not even in the cheese case yet because supply is limited. It’s made in small quantities in The Netherlands (as is Fourmage) and exported stingily. Mullican described it as “a brown butter crunch bomb.” It was shockingly rich for a hard cheese, full of crystals, nutty and with notes of caramel.

And we ended with grand noir, a German blue similar to Cambozola. It’s sweet and salty, pungent and creamy, just what you want in a blue cheese. It begged for a glass of Sauternes and soon, we’ll be able to have it.

Right now you can buy a bottle of wine at Greys, but it was lunch, there were two of us and work still to be done. Soon wine will be available by the glass and a sommelier is there to work with the cheese monger. 

Rendezvous ribs delivered to stalled barges before river traffic resumed

Gentry’s charcuterie was excellent. We had bresaola, capicola and soppressata, along with Gentry’s lemony olives and pickled cauliflower and house-made pickles from the kitchen at Greys.

You’re going to want to spend a little time browsing. The shelves are lined with condiments that will make you want to break your vow to streamline your cupboards (having just remodeled my kitchen, I’d promised this to myself).

I left with a jar of preserved lemons – because I always forget to make them myself – and a tiny jar of hard candies from France, but I could’ve stocked up on a dozen varieties of mustard, fancy pastas, tinned fish (I’ll be back; I know what I like), crackers galore, nuts and a number of items in the L’Epicurean line, from chocolate spreads to pistachio curd.

It gets even better, as there’s ample outdoor seating along with a bar inside and a couple of four tops.

Welcome to the neighborhood, Greys. We’ll be seeing more of each other.

Greys Fine Cheese and Entertaining, 709 S. Mendenhall Road, is open 1-5 p.m. Monday and 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Call 901-529-7046.