Cheese has been produced since ancient times, as it is a very nutritious, tasty, and healthy product made from natural milk. Hard cheeses presented on the shelves of many shops and supermarkets are produced on an industrial scale. Still, among them, you can also find high-quality cheeses and specimens made on small private farms and farms using their old technologies.
Note: the most fragrant and delicious cheeses are hard and dry, which have been ripening for a long time. The taste of hard cheese largely depends on the quality of the milk used for its production and the degree of heat treatment of this milk during the production of cheese.
Among the vast range of cheeses, choosing a natural hard cheese and avoiding a fake is not so easy; you need to know the signs and differences of a good product, which we will consider below.
Life Hack:
If you want to have a cheese party, we recommend using this cute cheese board set with knives from Royal Craft Wood.
Table of Contents
Cheese look
High-quality, expensive hard cheese must necessarily have a crust that should be uniform, without prominent spots and cracks, while the crust on the cheese should not be wet and peel off from the cheese itself. When buying sliced cheese, you should pay attention to its surface so that it is not sticky or weathered.
Cheese color
The cheese color should be white, light yellow, or light orange, uniform over the entire surface, without spots. The reddish and yellowish hue of the cheese is obtained due to the addition of food additives (beta-carotene or anatomy seed extract) to give it a more attractive and delicious appearance (this does not affect the taste of the cheese).
Cheese holes
High-quality natural cheese must have holes (eyes), except for Parmesan and Cheddar cheeses(we’re talking about hard cheeses now).
In a good cheese, the eyes are the same throughout the cheese cut, when the cheese eyes are large closer to the center, and small at the edges. Also, if in the amount it is clear that they gather into unconventional paths in some places, these are indicators of a poor-quality product.
The smell of cheese
The cheese should not smell like chemicals or yeast, nor should it smell rot and bitterness.
Cheese taste. Each type of cheese may have its specific taste, but in any case, it should not be very sour or bitter and also give off chemical additives.
Ingredients
Natural hard cheese must be made from milk. If the cheese label (packaging) says that there are vegetable fats (for example, palm oil), then this is a cheese product. Also, the composition should not contain any dyes and additives, especially flavors.
Cheese name
According to the rules, the package must indicate that this is cheese and not a cheese product.
Storage conditions
It would help if you did not buy cheese on the same counter or refrigerator section with sausages, fish, meat, or other strong-smelling foods (cheese absorbs odors well).
We sincerely hope that all our useful tips, prepared together with Royal Craft Wood company, will help you make the right choice of the best cheese!