Buying Cheese in Bulk? A Beginner’s Guide to Different Types of Cheese

There’s no doubt that cheese is one of the most popular food items and has been for thousands of years. Let’s face it, who doesn’t love cheese? This versatile food tastes great on its own and delicious when paired with other food or used as a cooking ingredient.

It can be easy to get overwhelmed by the truly exhaustive selection of cheeses that are now available from most cheese suppliers. We’re here to help you navigate the world of cheese. Whether you’re looking for bulk cheese for sale or are just a simple lover of the scrumptious yellow stuff, you’re in the right place. In this article, we’ll explore cheese in detail as we take a closer look at the different types of cheese. Read on and prepare to hear your stomach rumble:

Fresh cheese

Let’s kick off with our personal favourite – fresh cheese. Fresh or ‘unripened’ cheeses include any cheese that isn’t aged. These are usually soft and creamy in texture and taste very mild in terms of flavour. Within the world of fresh cheese, you can find a spectrum of distinct flavours, depending on the type of milk and the amount of salt within. The texture can also vary depending on how much moisture is drained. You can get more liquid-like fresh cheeses such as cottage cheese, or crumbly fresh cheeses such as queso fresco.

Some of the most popular fresh cheeses include cottage cheese, mascarpone, spreadable cream cheese and ricotta.

Hard cheese

When shopping for wholesale cheese, you’ll find parmesan and manchego in the hard cheese category. These cheeses are known for their salty and rich flavour. In terms of texture, they’re extremely hard without much moisture at all. Because of how hard they are, they’re often served grated over dishes such as pasta or soups.

Parmesan is a popular hard cheese that you’ll commonly find grated over pasta. It has a sharp and salty taste that adds a distinct flavour to any dish it is paired with.

Other popular hard cheeses include pecorino, asiago and manchego.

Pasta filata

Pasta filata (Italian for spun paste) includes fresh cheese curds that are steeped in hot water and stretched into different shapes. This category and style of cheese preparing originated from Italy, and the most famous one is undoubtedly mozzarella. What would modern-day pizza be without mozzarella? We certainly have a lot to thank Italy for!

Pasta filata cheese is created by the combination of heat and kneading. This process changes the structure of the cheese, so it’s likely to stretch more when it’s melted (which makes it ideal for pizza!). You can store these type of cheese in brine or water if you want to eat them fresh or age them to make them last longer. You can also smoke Pasta filata cheeses for a bit of extra flavour.

Other than mozzarella, popular pasta filata cheeses include burrata, provolone and caciocavallo.

Soft-ripened cheese

Soft-ripened cheeses are creamy and earthy cheeses that ripen from the outside. This means that the inside is often runnier than the outside. Examples of soft-ripened cheese include brie and camembert, both popular French kinds of cheese. The distinctive quality of these cheeses is that they come decked out with a thin rind of blooming mould.

Expert cheese suppliers will recommend that you eat soft-ripened cheese at room temperature as that’s when you’ll get the most flavour. If you smell too much ammonia, it’s time to throw it away.

Other than brie and camembert, cambozola is another popular soft-ripened cheese.

Blue cheese

Blue cheese is one of those food items that you either love or you hate. Many people adore the strong and nutty flavour of a good blue cheese with some crackers, while others are not too sure about the spidery blue veins that a ripe blue cheese develops.

If you’re not okay with eating cheese with mould, you’ll want to steer clear of blue cheese. The blue stuff you see on it is, in fact, mould.

Popular blue cheese examples include stilton, Roquefort and gorgonzola. They’re inoculated with different strains of mould which grow during the ageing process when exposed to air. If you like your cheese salty and sharp, try a blue cheese from your local cheese suppliers.

Semi-soft cheese

Semi-soft cheese is developed with a short ageing period of just a few months, resulting in a moist and creamy cheese with a mild flavour. Popular examples include Havarti, Jarlsberg and Chaumes.

Semi-hard cheese

This is a popular cheese category for bulk cheese for sale, as it includes some of the most commonly used cheeses – such as cheddar and gouda. Semi-hard cheeses get their flavour from how long they are aged for and from which strain of bacteria is introduced to the milk. The length of the ageing process determines how hard the cheese is and how sharp it will taste.

Other popular semi-hard cheeses include edam, Monterey Jack, swiss, gruyere and Emmental.

Processed cheese

Although most cheese enthusiasts cringe at the thought of processed cheese products, many people also love them. These products aren’t exactly fully made of cheese, but they do contain many of the same elements of cheese and some people even have their first taste of cheese as a processed cheese product. Processed cheese is often served in the form of single or in a melted liquid substance (such as with nachos) in the cinema. It tends to be quite salty and generally not very healthy for you. Although it’s good for an occasional treat!

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Looking for high-quality dairy products in London?

At Freshways, we’re committed to providing all of our clients across the UK with the very best and freshest milk and dairy products (cheese included!). We’re a friendly, independent and family-run wholesale business and always endeavour to provide the best service as well as the best products.

To find out more, please contact us today. You can find us at 16 Eastman Road, Acton, London, W3 7YG, call us on 0208 746 2046 or email us at info@freshways.co.uk.

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