Best American Cheese, Blind-Tasted & Ranked
American cheese is something of a contentious issue here in the Uproxx Life Slack chat. Our editor, Steve Bramucci, likes to defend it on the grounds of texture and meltiness, and says he even puts it on ramen. But apparently, I’m an insufferable faux-europhile because I’ve generally thought of it mostly as over-processed, non-cheese trash.
[Thank God we all agree that sharp cheddar is great. — ed.]
It tastes bland or bad and what’s the upside? That it “melts well?” When I make grilled cheese or cheeseburgers with cheddar slices it seems to melt just fine. Of course, I don’t normally buy the stuff, so maybe this opinion is outdated or based on ignorance. For my latest blind taste test/ranking, I bought every “American cheese” available near me to see if any of them could convert me.
Without getting too into the weeds of what “American Cheese” actually is and the various legal labels assorted with it, the basics are that it came out of a process invented in Switzerland, by which various cheese scraps could be combined into a sort of processed cheese product rather than wasted — kind of like we do with meat in sausages and hot dogs.
Canadian-born American emigree James Kraft patented a similar process in the US (apparently combining cheese and pasteurized milk in a copper kettle, then poured into sterile containers) in 1916, with the goal of creating a cheese with a longer shelf life. Some types come poured into individual packets, Kraft single-style, while other types come off a big block at the deli. These days, the milky, melty cheese product is still the second-most bought sliced cheese in America, as of 2019 (mozzerella was number one).
PART I — Methodology
For the purposes of this test… well, I just ate the cheese. And for once I didn’t have to cut it first! (*rimshot*). But seriously folks, I know there are a lot of disparate uses for American cheese — nachos, cheeseburgers, ramen, even apple pie…
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