You think you want a cheese with pedigree. The kind that reeks of washed rinds, that crunches with tyrosine crystals, that bears the name of a tiny European village in delicate, old-world type. But what you actually want — what your body, your cravings, your Fourth of July grill night wants — is ooze.
Ooze like only American cheese can provide. And yes, I mean that American cheese: the creamy, melty, ultra-processed stuff you grew up with and now pretend to be above.
It’s easy to write off American cheese as a relic of the processed-food age — a square of edible nostalgia, maybe, but not a serious ingredient. But lately, it’s been showing up in surprising places. Not just on backyard burgers, but in Michelin-starred kitchens, recipe test labs and the boardrooms of companies trying to give it a glow-up.
I’ll admit it: I’ve done my share of eye-rolling. I love cheese enough to have become a certified Level 1 cheesemonger through the Academy of Cheese (yes, that’s a real thing, and yes, you get a pin). That training taught me to appreciate a cheese with some complexity: a little age, a little smoke, a lot of nutty depth, maybe even those intoxicating saline crystals that crunch like sea salt. I learned the many shades of stink — from barnyard funk to gym sock to overripe fruit — and how to spot the difference.
But it also taught me that sometimes you just want the cream and spread of a classic American cheese slice. Especially this time of year, when burgers hit the grill more evenings than not, and the only thing between you and perfect melt is that humble orange square.
In March, Sargento announced they were launching a Natural American Cheese, a version made with just five real ingredients, offering a true cheese alternative to the classic processed slices, which often contain nine or more. It’s part of a slow but steady movement to reimagine American cheese not as a culinary punchline, but as a form worthy of innovation and respect.
Erin Price, general manager of the Consumer Products Business Unit at Sargento, told me that the push toward less processed foods isn’t new — but replicating American cheese’s magic without additives has been a long-standing challenge. “And in the cheese category, we’ve seen the kind of the migration from processed to natural over multiple, multiple years,” she said. “But no one could ever exactly replicate that melt, that texture, that flavor, that creaminess — that ‘grilled cheese performance’ — in a natural cheese.”
For Sargento, it took a full decade of R&D. Ten years of trying, tweaking and trying again. Rod Hogan, Sargento’s Senior Vice President of Innovation, has been there for all of it.
“So you likely know that the product most people associate with ‘American cheese’ is a pasteurized processed cheese,” he explained. “That involves taking a natural cheese, like cheddar, melting it down and adding other stuff to it — fats, oils, water, emulsifiers — to turn it into a liquid mass that’s then cooled and sliced.” That’s the version most of us know: the one that coats your mouth in salty velvet and fuses to toasted bread like edible glue.
What Sargento has done, Hogan says, is build a cheese that’s made like a natural cheddar or Monterey Jack — just five ingredients, no emulsifiers, no artificial melt-enhancers — but engineered to behave the way a Kraft Single does: smooth, melty, creamy and familiar. (I’ve since tried the Sargento singles, and can confirm: they’re quite oozy.) “It is made in a natural cheese plant. It isn’t cooked. There aren’t emulsifiers added,” he said. “But it delivers what we know consumers love about American slices.”
Sargento isn’t the only one trying to rethink American cheese. In the chef world, the form is getting its own small renaissance — not as an ironic nod to childhood, but as a functional, flavorful ingredient that deserves intention. That’s exactly what drove chef Eric Greenspan, author of “The Great Grilled Cheese Book,” to co-found New School American Cheese. “Everybody makes their own buns, they grind their own meat,” he told Food & Wine in 2024. “I feel like there should be a way to close that circle of quality.”
Greenspan’s proprietary recipe dials up the flavor while preserving what people actually love about American cheese: the saltiness, the creaminess, the melt. New School uses a base of barrel-aged cheddar, blended with butter, cream and just a touch of paprika and turmeric for that classic orange hue. The secret to the stretch? Sodium citrate — a food-safe salt that binds the cheese and cream together into that iconic velvety texture Kraft first developed back in the 1910s.
Last year, New School brought its chef-approved slices to the masses, launching cheese blocks, slices and shreds in retail stores around the country. Suddenly, artisanal American cheese — with its aged cheddar backbone and melt-you-can-feel-in-your-bones texture — wasn’t just a niche kitchen secret. It was a grocery store staple.
“Everybody wants an emotional reaction to the food that they eat,” Greenspan told Food & Wine. “There’s nothing more nostalgic than a slice of American cheese.”
On the topic of nostalgia, there are moments when no matter how many fancy cheeses you’ve tried, no matter how many flavor notes you can identify, only one thing will do. For chef David Chang, that moment is a diner patty melt — and the cheese that makes it sing is, without question, American.
In a 2017 Eater interview, when asked about his “don’t look at the menu” order, Chang didn’t hesitate. A patty melt. Cheese? “American, always.”
Want more great food writing and recipes? Sign up for Salon’s free food newsletter, The Bite.
For what it’s worth, Chang doesn’t just talk the talk; he uses American cheese in his own cooking, like the Momofuku Goods grilled cheese recipe featuring chili crunch, Kewpie mayonnaise, salted butter and, of course, two slices of American cheese. I also remember a visit about a decade ago to the now-closed Momofuku CCDC in D.C., where I had a steamed bun with crispy maple pork belly, an over-easy egg and melted American cheese — very upscale McGriddle vibes.
There’s a lesson here, I think: don’t try to push American cheese into a place where you really want gouda or Muenster or Gruyère. It’s like how some days call for an expertly crafted Boulevardier, and others just want a shot of Old Forester with a splash of ginger ale.
American cheese shines as the creamy base for homemade macaroni and cheese or game-day queso, dotted with spicy beef or chorizo. Let it get melty in a late-night grilled cheese (chili crisp optional, a la David Chang) or in an at-home BEC moment, best consumed in socked feet standing in front of a window AC doing its best to keep up with the summer heat.
And in the spirit of the July 4th weekend, make sure you’ve got some on hand to ooze over a burger, whether chargrilled or smashed. Maybe it’s not fancy, but it’s faithful — the kind of cheese that always shows up when you need it most. The one that melts without drama, that wraps a burger or grilled cheese in creamy comfort, and reminds you that sometimes the simplest pleasures are the richest.
The post American cheese has always been enough appeared first on Salon.com.