90 articles
American cheese
American cheese is a pasteurized process cheese blending cheddar or colby with emulsifying salts such as sodium citrate, invented in Switzerland in 1911 and commercialized by J. L. Kraft in 1916; known for smooth melting, wrapped slices, and high sodium.
Anhydrous milk fat
Anhydrous milk fat (AMF, butter oil, anhydrous butterfat) is concentrated butterfat, 99.8% minimum fat and 0.1% maximum moisture, made from milk, cream, or butter; used in recombined dairy, chocolate, and bakery.
Asiago cheese
Asiago is an Italian PDO semi-cooked cow's milk cheese from Vicenza and Trento provinces, made in two types: Fresco (pressato), mild and aged 20 days, and Stagionato (d'allevo), made from partially skimmed milk and aged at least 90 days.
Boursin cheese
Boursin cheese, a French fresh cow's milk spread also called Gournay cheese, created by François Boursin in Normandy; Garlic & Fine Herbs launched 1963, famous for "Du pain, du vin, du Boursin," now owned by Bel Group.
Brie
Brie: French soft cow's-milk cheese with a bloomy white rind from the Brie region near Paris; Brie de Meaux and Brie de Melun hold AOC (1980) and PDO protection, made from raw milk with at least 45% fat in dry matter.
Brunost
Brunost (brown cheese, mysost, gjetost) is Norway's sweet caramel whey cheese, made by boiling whey with milk and cream; invented by Anne Hov in 1863, 35-40% lactose, sliced thin with an ostehøvel.
Buffalo mozzarella
Buffalo mozzarella (mozzarella di bufala), notably Mozzarella di Bufala Campana PDO, is an Italian fresh pasta filata cheese from water buffalo milk, PDO-registered in 1996, made within 60 hours of milking, creamier and richer than cow's-milk mozzarella.
Burrata
Burrata, also known as Burrata di Andria, is a fresh Italian cow's-milk cheese from Andria in Apulia, made as a mozzarella shell filled with creamy stracciatella.
Butter
Butter is a solid dairy fat with over 80% lipid, made by churning cream; also called beurre. Distinguished from ghee (99.6% milk fat) and margarine (vegetable oils); main fatty acids palmitic, myristic, oleic.
Camel milk
Camel milk, from the dromedary and Bactrian camel, is a staple of arid-region pastoralists, similar to cow milk but saltier, lacking β-lactoglobulin, richer in vitamin C, and increasingly commercially processed despite UHT and cheese-making difficulties.
Camembert
Camembert: soft, bloomy-rind cow's milk cheese from Normandy, France; Camembert de Normandie (AOC 1983, PDO 1996) requires raw milk, ladle molding in five layers, 250 g, 45% fat, 21-day ripening, poplar box.
Casein
Casein, also known as casein protein, is a family of phosphoproteins that make up about 80% of the protein in cow's milk and forms the curds in cheesemaking.
Casu martzu
Casu martzu (casu marzu), also called casu modde or casu fràzigu, is a Sardinian sheep milk cheese ripened by live Piophila casei larvae. Banned from EU sale since 2002, it remains a traditional PAT-listed Sardinian delicacy.
Cheddar cheese
Cheddar cheese: hard cow's-milk cheese from Cheddar, Somerset, made by cheddaring (stacking and turning curd); ripened via glycolysis, lipolysis, proteolysis; West Country Farmhouse Cheddar holds a PDO.
Cheese
Cheese, or natural cheese, is coagulated milk curd drained of whey and often ripened. Covers acid vs rennet coagulation, ripening microbiology (Swiss eyes, Camembert), classification, nutrition, and legal naming standards.
Cheese curd
Cheese curd, also called squeaky cheese, is fresh unpressed cheddar taken from the vat before aging; its casein-calcium protein mesh squeaks against teeth, a freshness marker fading within 24-72 hours.
Clarified butter
Clarified butter (ghee, Sanskrit ghrita) is butter with water and milk solids removed, leaving nearly pure butterfat; ghee is the further-browned, nutty-tasting version. Covers composition (99.6%+ fat per FAO), smoke point around 250 °C, shelf life, Sanskrit/Vedic origins, regional names like samn and smen, and the measured health evidence.
Clotted cream
Clotted cream (Cornish: dehen molys), also called Devonshire cream, is a thick West Country cream of at least 55% butterfat made by scalding milk; Cornish clotted cream holds PDO status since 1998.
Colby cheese
Colby cheese: American semi-firm washed-curd cow's-milk cheese created in 1885 by Joseph Steinwand in Colby, Wisconsin; orange from annatto, under 40% moisture, aged 1–3 months, milder than cheddar, base of Colby-Jack.
Comté cheese
Comté: French AOP raw cow's milk cooked pressed cheese from the Jura massif, made in 40 kg wheels from Montbéliarde milk in cooperative fruitières, aged at least 120 days, France's largest AOP by tonnage.
Condensed milk
Condensed milk, also called sweetened condensed milk, is cow's milk concentrated by water removal with sugar added as preservative; distinct from unsweetened evaporated milk, which is sterilized. Invented commercially by Gail Borden in 1856.
Cotija cheese
Cotija cheese (queso Cotija), also called queso añejo, is a hard, salty, raw-milk Mexican cow's-milk cheese from the Sierra de Jalmich between Michoacán and Jalisco, aged months to a year, grated over elote and beans, protected by the 2005 collective mark and norm NMX-F-735-COFOCALEC-2011.
Cottage cheese
Cottage cheese: a fresh, unripened acid-coagulated soft cheese of washed curd particles (3–12 mm), often cream-dressed; named in 19th-century North America (Bartlett 1848), distinct from ricotta and quark.
Cream
Cream (dairy): the fat-rich fraction of milk, an oil-in-water emulsion separated centrifugally from whole milk. Fat content ranges from 10.5% (half and half) to 80% (plastic cream); used for butter, ghee, ice cream, and coffee. First continuous separator by Gustaf de Laval, 1877.
Cream cheese
Cream cheese is a soft, mild, spreadable unripened cheese made from milk and cream, created in New York in 1875 and used on bagels, in dips, and in cheesecake.
Crème fraîche
Crème fraîche is French cultured cream with 30-40% milkfat, legally defined in France as pasteurized cream packaged within 24 hours; thicker, milder, and more heat-stable than sour cream.
Curd
Curd is the solid casein gel formed when milk coagulates by acid, rennet, or acid plus heat, separating from whey; it is the basis of cheese, paneer, cottage cheese, and, in Indian usage, yogurt.
Dairy product
Dairy products are foods made from milk, including drinking milk, fermented milks, cheese, butter, and whey products. EU law reserves names like yogurt and kephir; EU farms produced 160.0 million tonnes of raw milk in 2022.
Edam cheese
Edam cheese: Dutch semi-hard sweet-curd cow's-milk cheese from Edam, North Holland; part-skim (unlike whole-milk Gouda), spherical red-wax export form, about 40% milk fat in solids, PGI as Edam Holland.
Emmental cheese
Emmental (Emmentaler) is a hard Swiss cow's-milk cheese from the Emme valley, defined by propionic acid fermentation that creates its large eyes and nutty flavor; Swiss Emmentaler AOP requires raw milk, while generic emmental is made across Europe.