Title.
It feels like such a waste.
EDIT: This is the type of cheese I am referring to. It comes wrapped in a piece of plastic then bundled together with x more and all of them get covered in plastic
I think I can answer this. I remember when the singles came out. Used to be they had American cheese in a block. Sort of. They were sliced and stacked. This was the same American cheese/cheese product used in the singles. Exact same dimensions. The package was not re-sealable though. So I always put my block in a quart zip lock after opening. People were too fucking dumb to do this so their block of American cheese would go stale. And they complained about slices getting stuck together. Why in the world did Kraft decide to make the singles instead of changing the packaging be resealable and have wax paper like every other cheese? I have no idea.
Why in the world did Kraft decide to make the singles instead of changing the packaging be resealable and have wax paper like every other cheese?
Because unfortunately, the average American is that stupid and lazy.
Source: am American and forgot how to spell camplekated words so I ju
It’s kind of convenient for grilling on the go. Have 4 patties, grab 4 slices and throw them in the top of the cooler, rather than the entire cheese pack, or repacking 4 slices.
In Australia, the only cheese you could buy in the supermarket in the 1970s was Kraft in the little blue packets sold in the dry goods section.
To buy “real” cheese you had to go to a dairy, or go to the city centre and buy cheese cut off the block and wrapped in greaseproof paper from a contintental delicatessan.
Polyethylene film was not available.
So when it came out and you could buy real cheese in film from the supermarket, Kraft responded by bringing out "more convenient " Kraft Singles, which you didn’t have to laboriously (?) cut from the block.
That’s not cheese. It’s “cheese product.”
It’s “orange” and “oil”
It’s American cheese. The objectively superior cheese for melting on a burger.
only because it’s easy to melt, not because it actually taste better than other cheese options such as cheddar, swiss, or pepper jack.
Oh, but it does actually taste better specifically on a burger.
American “cheese product” can fuck right off. Gouda melts just as well and actually tastes like…you know…cheese.
No, it doesn’t melt nearly as well. It does once you add emulsifying salts to the Gouda.
You stock emulsifying salts?
Yes, do you not? I’m still going through the package I bought 3 years ago.
If you like eating melted plastic
Are you scared of emulsifying agents, or what do you call “plastic”? There is no plastic in American cheese.
if you equate not liking something with being “scared”, that says much ore about you than it does me.
I don’t feel the need to misrepresent things I don’t like. So why do you?
Kenji Lopez-Alt has a cool video where he uses American cheese as the emulsifier to make some less-melty cheeses participate in a grilled cheese. I have been using it more for its emulsifying agents than anything lately: https://youtu.be/CD8UTr5mMVk?si=n5xOumvtBqromQtB
You’re thinking of cheese wizz or spray cheese.
No, I’m not.
Edit: replied to wrong comment
American cheese apparently melts so at least it makes some kind of sense.
Kraft singles in Australia are basically made from the same plastic as the packaging and are in no danger of melting or being mistaken for cheese.
Makes them easier to separate.
If you buy cheese sliced by your grocer, they generally won’t put anything between the slices, maybe just some wax paper.
But harder to unwrap.
Let’s be honest here, we aren’t talking about cheese. They are packed per slice because they melt easily. If they weren’t you would end up with an orange blob when it hits room temperature.
To get some free cheese with all that plastic you’re buying
it is stupid and should at least not be done with plastic. there is a brand of cheese where it’s entirely wrapped in compostable plastic (has the texture of baking paper) and is seperated with the same material. the best option would be to buy cheese that doesn’t stick together easily (like gouda).
if i buy the store brand american cheese at my supermarket, they’re not individually packed and aren’t really that hard to separate on their own, so lmao idk why Kraft does that.
I’m pretty sure that wrapping is part of the manufacturing process of the “cheese slice”. It matches the contours of the wrapping too perfectly.
It bundles them together. Imagine buying a loose handful of slices, it doesn’t work well.
I’ve bought plenty like that, they’re sliced and bundled together in a plastic container. Unless there is some substance between them that I’m unaware of
I was talking about the outer plastic.
The kind of cheese slices I’m thinking of are sort of a solidified cheeze-wiz substance, I suspect that if there was nothing between them they’d merge back together into the blob they were probably originally extruded from.
Not only that, but iirc they are packaged in liquid form and it solidifies into flat sheets as they are pressed together.
You ever go to a deli?
Those aren’t individually wrapped in slippery plastic.
That kind of “cheese” is super melty, you can get American cheese made just like other cheese, it just isn’t this.
My point is that deli slices of American cheese don’t come individually wrapped. They’re usually wrapped in wax paper and tossed in a bag. It’s only the artificially shelf stable shit that does. Unfortunately people are lazy and don’t want to wait 5 minutes so it’s more popular.
It probably melts and you have one block of cheese once it’s on the shelves of the store. (I’d have to test that hypothesis. But that stuff is really sticky and soft. I bet you can’t slice it and have it stay like that any other way.)
Other than that: convenience. People even buy pre-sliced Gouda.
Odds are, because its cheaper than a cardboard box.
I never understood why Americans eat this so called cheese. Why cant they just buy like real cheese that melts? It serves the same purpose but is actually cheese with lots of taste and aroma. I just dont get it.
It makes us feel very French to eat cheddar fond.
American here. That oily “cheese” is gross. We have normal cheese, even normal pre-sliced cheese that doesn’t have the plastic film wrapping it. The brand I normally get for sandwiches has a plastic zip-lock package, and the slices themselves are separated by wax paper. I prefer the pepper jack, but sometimes I go for swiss or provolone.
I’m American and don’t get it either. When I was younger that was the only cheese I knew and I decided I didn’t like cheese because of it. It took a long time to realize that stuff isn’t real cheese and that the real stuff is very good.
I also think it isn’t legal to call some of it “cheese”. I know Kraft singles at the very least uses some deceptive phrasing to say it’s cheese-like or cheese-flavored or something like that instead of calling it “cheese”.
It is a big waste! Unless your cheese melts very easily, there is no reason to have that amount of plastic.
This kind of cheese has a very low melt point.
The entire purpose of this cheese is is incredibly low melt point.
