How to distinguish cheese from a cheese product without harming your health? How to distinguish cheese from a cheese product. Advice from professionals What is added to cheese to reduce the cost

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The abundance of cheese varieties on the shelves of our stores makes our eyes wide open. How to choose high-quality hard cheese from this variety, because manufacturers, trying to reduce the cost of the product, use harmful substances in its production food additives and even milk substitutes? We looked for the answer to this question in our article.

What is cheese made from?

High-quality hard cheese should be made from:

milk. It determines the fat content of the product: the more milk, the higher the calorie content of the cheese wheel. Of course, someone may object: milk can be harmful to health, we already wrote about this in the article “Is it harmful for men to drink milk?” . But in general, there are still more benefits from this natural product than harm;

sourdough Its role is played by lactic or propionic acid bacteria that curdle milk;

rennet element. Previously, it was used as an enzyme of animal origin, extracted from calf stomachs. Nowadays, manufacturers are increasingly replacing rennets with synthetic analogues.

Cheese can be disappointing. It can be boring, it can be primitive, it can be too sophisticated. However, cheese is still milk's leap into immortality. Clifton Fadiman, American writer

Cheese made from the above elements will have white, bland taste and short shelf life - a maximum of a month at low temperatures. To give the cheese an appetizing yellowish tint and a pleasant taste, as well as to extend its life, the following is added to it:

table salt. It affects taste and serves as a natural preservative;

annatto extract. A dye of vegetable origin, designated on the packaging as E 160b. It is considered safe for humans, although in some cases it can cause an allergic reaction;

beta carotene. Natural dye, giving the cheese an orange tint. It is marked with the alphanumeric code E 160a and is absolutely non-toxic;

calcium chloride (calcium chloride). A hardener that can also increase the volume of the product. It is designated E 509 and does not pose a danger if the permissible dose is not exceeded. Otherwise it causes intestinal irritation;

potassium nitrate (potassium nitrate, E 252). A preservative, seemingly related to non-toxic substances, nevertheless its use in baby food forbidden. Some scientists claim: this additive is a carcinogen and can cause cancer and nervous disorders.

How to fake cheese

However, if you strictly follow the standards, the resulting product is quite expensive - at least 350 rubles / kg, and ripened cheeses - 500-1000 rubles. To make it cheaper, manufacturers resort to various tricks that have a positive effect on cost, but a negative impact on quality.

If the country does not have at least fifty varieties of cheese and good wine, which means the country has reached the end of its rope. Salvador Dali, Spanish painter

The most common “trick” to reduce the cost is replacing milk with palm oil. Despite the existing prejudice against this product, this vegetable fat can be harmless if you do not exceed established consumption standards and use edible grades of oil.

Unfortunately, in Russia, in the production of cheeses, cheaper industrial palm oil is often used or the limits on its use are not observed. As a result, we get an ersatz product that negatively affects cardiovascular system. Such a surrogate should be called a cheese product, but unscrupulous manufacturers often “forget” to indicate this on the packaging. Therefore, it is better not to trust labels, but to learn to distinguish hard cheese from a fake.

See more about ways to fake cheeses here:

How to distinguish a quality product?

There are five rules for recognizing quality cheese:

product from vegetable fats more elastic, you can easily make a ball out of it, like plasticine, but not with real cheese made from milk;

real hard cheese does not “sweat” - droplets of “moisture” appearing on a slice taken from the refrigerator mean that it contains vegetable fats;

the presence of a whitish coating indicates spoilage of the cheese, looseness indicates freezing, the presence of bubbles under the rind indicates an excess of bacteria due to improper storage;

The color of the cheese should be uniform, but not bright, and the holes should be evenly distributed. By the way, the more regular the shape of these holes, the more “noble” the product;

An excess of chemical additives that retain water can be determined by dripping iodine onto hard cheese. A blue spot that appears will mean: you are “lucky” to buy a low-quality product.

Don't let yourself be deceived, and let the food on your table always be fresh and of high quality.

Take it for yourself and tell your friends!

Real cheese and its “modern analogue”

Real cheese is made from milk using bacterial fermentation and natural enzymes. This product is popular and loved by children and adults in many countries around the world, and Ukraine is no exception. Therefore, the production of hard cheeses is a very promising business.

But - expensive raw materials for real cheese. To make their product accessible to a wider range of consumers, manufacturers are actively using modern technologies food industry, namely, they replace milk fat with vegetable oils. For example, palm or coconut. The quality of the cheese and its health benefits, of course, suffer from this. But the price becomes more affordable, and product sales increase.

But according to GOST requirements for the production of hard cheeses, cheese must be made only from dairy raw materials. And the presence of vegetable fats in the cheese indicates that this is not real cheese, but a cheese product.

However, the buyer himself has the right to choose whether to buy him cheese or a cheese product. If you want to know about the quality of the cheese you eat, take the time to read the product label and understand the tricks that manufacturers and sellers have prepared for us.

Basic criteria for cheese quality

It is very difficult to distinguish a cheese product from a real one hard cheese By appearance. But there are basic criteria that will help you understand the quality of the product.

Product price. The cheese product costs several times less than cheeses from well-known manufacturers, especially international ones. This product is usually placed as close to customers' eyes as possible and away from famous brands of cheese.

Cheese composition. Read the label. The composition is limited to milk, lactic acid culture, rennet or other milk-clotting preparations of animal origin. Allowed salt content and calcium chloride. If any of the following is present on the product label, you have a cheese product:

Powdered milk
Palm, coconut or other vegetable oil
Preservatives, stabilizers, dyes and other food additives
Flavor Substitutes

Product name. Again, pay attention to the label. By law, a manufacturer cannot put the name “cheese” on a cheese product, even if the product label, at first glance, looks like real cheese.

Commercial tricks and cheese quality

By law, manufacturers are required to indicate the name and actual composition of the cheese on the product label. But they don't always do this. For example, they conceal the presence of vegetable fat, which is used instead of milk fat. Or indicated on the label cheese product the word "cheese".

In addition, an uninitiated buyer may be deceived not by the manufacturer, but by the trading establishment. For example, the original packaging is labeled “cheese product” and the corresponding composition is indicated, but when sliced, only the weight, date and price remain on the packaging. We don’t buy cheese by the head!

In this case, let's try to determine by appearance. Real cheese has a fairly pale color. A bright and rich orange-yellow color is a sign of an abundance of food coloring.

The presence of vegetable fats in the product is indicated by oily drops on pieces of cheese. If, when cutting a product, a smearing consistency remains on the knife, this is a sign that the cheese is made from milk powder.

The surface of real cheese should be smooth and slightly dull. The larger and more uniform the “holes” on the cheese, the better quality product. The main principle of buying cheese by weight is to choose a familiar cheese from a well-known manufacturer, when heads, bars or circles of cheese with a factory label are laid out nearby.

Elena Kukuevitskaya

In our turbulent times, when cheese is, to put it mildly, not cheap, manufacturers en masse supply its unique analogue - a cheese product - to store shelves. It costs much less than the original cheese, which means it is more affordable for the buyer. Plus, visually the cheese and the cheese product differ quite little. What is the difference between them? Let's figure it out.

Let's start with the fact that cheese is a dairy product, since it actually consists of milk with the addition of various rennet enzymes, sourdough, etc. At the same time, a cheese product is a milk-containing product, not a dairy product. As a rule, it contains no more than 20% milk. The rest is fat and protein, which have nothing in common with milk. Oh yes, and, of course, they prepare the cheese product, generously using the well-known palm or coconut oil.

Hence the much lower price compared to regular cheese. The components are significantly cheaper, so you can play around with the price. To please the client, so to speak.

But is it worth buying such “joy”? The Internet is simply overflowing with articles about the dangers of palm oil, which, due to its cheapness, is now added to everything possible. Transgenic fats, which can cause thrombosis, cholecystitis, etc. – have you heard this? It all starts with palm oil.

Therefore, whether or not to buy a cheese product is, of course, up to you. And ours is to give 5 simple tips that will help you distinguish cheese from a cheese product. 🙂

1. Of course, the price. A cheese product will always cost significantly less than even the cheapest cheese.

2. Carefully study the label with the name and the sticker with the composition. Manufacturers are very fond of lying, since by law it is forbidden to call a cheese product cheese. So companies have to resort to tricks, calling their “cheese clones” Syrochka, Cheesecake, etc.

If you don’t find the word “cheese” anywhere on the package, this is a purebred cheese product.

3. Always read the product ingredients in full. Especially, as usual, everything that is written in the smallest font. If you find palm or coconut oil, vegetable fats and other non-milk products somewhere in the composition, you should know that this “cheese” is not cheese at all!

4. There is a folk method for recognizing a cheese product. If suddenly the cheese you like does not have a label or other identifying marks - it is simply sealed in polyethylene or something similar, press it with your fingers. If some liquid starts to come out from your pressure, it means that this “cheese” contains vegetable fats. So this is a cheese product.

Can real cheese contain artificial additives? How to distinguish a cheese product from cheese? These questions are of interest to the modern buyer. Cheese is one of the main sources of calcium, protein,...

Can real cheese contain artificial additives? How to distinguish a cheese product from cheese? These questions interest the modern buyer.

Cheese is one of the main sources of calcium, protein, fat, and a number of essential minerals and vitamins for the body, but sad as it may be to realize, there are much more counterfeit cheeses on our store shelves than real hard cheese.

The thing is that manufacturers massively reduce the cost of this product by adding a huge number of milk substitutes, including palm oil. The latter contains a shocking amount of vegetable fats for the body: even a small piece can exceed the daily requirement!

The consequences of such consumption are very disappointing: excess fat clogs blood vessels and causes a strong blow to the liver and pancreas. Just imagine what irreparable damage a cheese product can cause to a child’s body! Therefore, we decided to find out which cheese is not a fake.

How to distinguish cheese from a cheese product

Some manufacturers write about this directly on the packaging. We thank them for the truth, but we believe that such food products should not be present in stores at all. Often the cheese product is much cheaper than real cheese. Be careful, don't fall for the cheap price.

It is better to eat less real cheese than a decent piece of cheese product, otherwise you will have health problems.

It is better to avoid vacuum-packed cheese. Choose a piece cut from the whole head, so you will be less likely to get a fake. Pay attention to the crust of the cheese wheel. There should be no cracks or plaque on it, otherwise there is a risk of buying harmful bacteria along with the cheese or buying expensive but completely tasteless cheese.

High-quality cheese is characterized by a uniform pattern, uniform structure, and even symmetrical holes. If you are a lover of Parmesan and other similar varieties, you should pay attention to the price and reputation of the manufacturer. In other cases, our test will help you.

Cheese quality test

Take a slice of purchased cheese room temperature and carefully bend it at a right angle. The cheese should not crack at the bend! It would be right to refuse loose cheese, which easily crumbles and wrinkles. Most likely, what you see is palm oil mixed with milk powder and dyes.

Be vigilant and eat only healthy foods!

Now in all grocery stores and hypermarkets there is a huge abundance of any product and product. On the counters with cheeses, the assortment sometimes exceeds 100 types. Moreover, they all differ from each other in taste and constituent characteristics.

In this abundance it is very difficult to choose quality and fresh cheese, instead of which you may accidentally buy a cheese product.

How to distinguish between cheese and a cheese product so as not to run into a fake? What is a cheese product?

Cheese and cheese product differ in the composition of ingredients. Real cheese can only contain milk, or its artificial analogues, fermented milk starter, and salt to improve curdling. All this is easily absorbed and digested in the stomach, which is why cheese is invaluable for the human body.

Cheese product like this beneficial properties does not have it, since it only looks and tastes like cheese, but in reality it is something completely different. It contains no more than 20% real milk, and the rest is fat and protein of non-dairy origin.

As a rule, manufacturers of such products use cheap coconut or palm oil in their production.

It would seem that there is nothing wrong, because vegetable oils good for health. It depends. So, in the case of palm, rapeseed and coconut oils containing saturated fats, they are even dangerous for the human body. These oils are converted into trans-isomer or transgenic fats and subsequently cause cardiovascular diseases, cholecystitis, obesity, atherosclerosis, vascular thrombosis, etc.

How to distinguish cheese from a cheese product?

1. You should carefully study the labeling (the product should not contain any vegetable fats, neither palm nor coconut, only milk fat).

2. Pay attention to the cost of the product (vegetable oils are very cheap, which allows the manufacturer to offer the end consumer an attractive price for cheese; the percentage of these oils can vary, from a small additive to an almost complete replacement of milk fat).

In European countries, you can also find similar products in economy-class stores, but the percentage of vegetable fats in the composition is very small.

3. In the case of packaged and wrapped cheese that does not have a label, it is impossible to find out the composition of the product; you can only rely on your own experience and intuition. Press the cheese with your fingers: if liquid flows out of the cheese, then most likely the product contains vegetable fats.

4. should be a natural shade and uniform. Cheese that is too yellow contains artificial colors.

5. Pay attention to the size and shape of the cheese eyes. In natural cheese, they are of regular shape with smooth edges, evenly distributed over the entire surface of the cheese. Large eyes in the middle of the cheese circle and small ones at the edges are a sure sign of a fake.

6. The cheese crust must be free of cracks and plaque, which indicate improper storage and low quality.

7. Pay attention to the composition of the cheese, which should be indicated on the product label. The law obliges all manufacturers to indicate the actual composition of the products they manufacture, but they do not always do this. The packaging of natural cheese should not contain such components as:
- soy;
- palm oil;
— sunflower oil;
— preservatives;
- taste substitutes.