CHEDDAR AND AMERICAN FULL-CREAM CHEESE.
Cheddar cheese—named from the English village where it originated—is a comparatively old type of cheese, very popular in England and also in the United States. The name is now more fitly applied to a process than to any particular shape.
Cheddar cheese is made from sweet cows’ milk, which may be skimmed, partly skimmed, or unskimmed. If made from unskimmed milk the cheese is called “full cream.” If cream is removed the cheese is designated “part-skim” or “skim,” as the case may be.
Cheese of Cheddar type as made in the United States is perhaps most often marketed in large, flat, round forms, 13 to 16 inches in diameter, about 5 or 6 inches in height, and weighing 26 to 32 pounds each, though other shapes and sizes are also fairly common. It is usually pale to darker yellow in color, though it may be white when uncolored. When fresh it is mild in flavor, but when well ripened has a characteristic and sharp taste. The new cheese is soft, though not waxy, in texture, and may be easily shaved or broken into small pieces. When well ripened it may be finely grated.
These characteristics, together with its distinctive and peculiar flavor and its wide distribution in the markets, are qualities which help to make it the variety most commonly used in the United States.
Sage cheese is a variety of Cheddar cheese, which is flavored with sage and is further characterized by the green mottled appearance formerly due to bits of sage leaf but now generally obtained in another way.