What Is String Cheese?

Usually people, such as a date sitting across from you at the table, frown at pinching and pulling at your food. Luckily for us pinchers and pullers, string cheese exists and can be bought from any grocery store. It is practically tailor made to be fiddled with! Yep, with the help of string cheese, that second date’s going to go great! 

What is string cheese? 

String cheese is a handy tube of plastic-wrapped cheese, made so you can pull thin, stringy strips of it off to eat. It’s the snack that puts “don’t play with your food” to the ultimate test. It’s a perfect fit for lunchboxes, to ensure kids get their calcium for the day. Or, if they’re not into the whole “balanced meal” thing, they can trade it to their friend for an Ecto-Cooler or a Zebra Cake. 

What kind of cheese is string cheese? 

String cheese is almost always low-moisture mozzarella, as that’s the only cheese that has the stringy quality so cherished by elementary schoolers across the country. You can sometimes find it made with a cheddar mixture, but anything else pushes the limits of “stringability” (my word, not the industry term as far as I know).

How is string cheese made?

String cheese is achieved by simultaneously stretching the cheese with an auger and heating it to 140 degrees Fahrenheit. This causes the milk proteins to align, thus making it possible to peel off the delicious strips. I’m honestly pretty astonished that there isn’t a Sesame Street segment showing how it’s manufactured…I can practically hear the music! Get on that, Children’s Television Workshop!

Who invented string cheese?

String cheese was invented in 1976 by Frank Baker, a Wisconsin cheesemaker. The idea was to create “bite sized mozzarella cheese.” It originally came in one pound bags, with around fifteen sticks loose inside, but that posed a problem when it came to lasting freshness. Once manufacturers began individually wrapping the cheese, things really started taking off. The vacuum packaging extended the shelf life of the cheese, which meant it could be enjoyed at a later date without fear of wasting food. 

How to eat string cheese

Don’t get me wrong, school is great for a lot of things, but the simple fact remains that you only learn how to eat string cheese from trial and error. First thing’s first, of course: make sure it’s out of its plastic shrink-wrapping. Then, be sure to pull your strings longways, from top to bottom. I’ve found that, try as I might, it’s near impossible to get the string to pull width-wise. Then again, if you’re someone in a hurry, you can always just eat the whole stick in a few big chomps. Some folks will say that’s defeating the purpose, but remember there’s no set laws when it comes to snacking. It’s the wild west, so everybody, saddle up.

String cheese is a wonderful snack at any age, and always welcome in my refrigerator. And, as one final perk, if you’re super diligent, you can lace up your sneakers with the cheesy strands.

Best String Cheese

Now that you know what string cheese is, find out about the best string cheese you can buy. We taste test the top string cheese brands to find the top snacks.