When To Use Pre-Shredded Cheese (And When Not To), According to an Expert

The use of bagged pre-shredded cheddar might come with some tradeoffs in your recipe.

Few recipes in the North American culinary canon can’t be improved by the addition of cheese. It can bring a rich and creamy element to casseroles, burgers, and even apple pie.

Knowing the right kind of cheese to use will guarantee you make the most of this cherished ingredient. And depending on the dish you're making, you might want to avoid using the bag of pre-shredded cheese in your fridge. 

I spoke to Jill Allen, certified cheese judge and Director of Product Excellence at Tillamook County Creamery Association, about the difference between chunk or block cheddar cheese (as an example) and the bagged pre-shredded kind.

Cheddar is a beautifully simple recipe, and both the block and the shreds start from the same basic formula. “In your standard chunk block of cheddar, the ingredients are going to be cultured milk, salt, enzymes, and possibly annatto for the coloring,” said Allen, referring to the natural additive that gives yellow cheddar its hue.

“That’s the standard cheddar matrix. Cheddar cheese loves to clump back together, so when you have a shredded product, in order to get it into the bag and maintain its beautiful fluffiness, they have to add anticake.”

What Are Anticaking Agents?

The majority of anticaking agents on the market are made primarily of cellulose powder, potato starch, or some combination of the two. (These days, Tillamook uses potato starch, though it did use cellulose powder in the past.)

Natamycin is added to the anticake at a very small parts per million. It is a natural mold inhibitor. “Cheddar cheese is a favorite medium for mold to grow on,” explains Allen.

The mixture also includes glucose oxidase, an enzyme that consumes the oxygen added to keep the shreds fluffy and mold-free. Once the enzyme has consumed all the oxygen, it’s no longer present in the bag, which is why you don’t see it on the ingredient label. 

When (and When Not to) Use Pre-Shredded Cheese

The use of bagged pre-shredded cheddar might come with some tradeoffs in your recipe.

“One of the reasons you might not want that starch system in your recipe is that it does slightly hinder aromas, flavors, and the melting and stretching capabilities of that cheddar cheese,” Allen said, explaining that the anticake can interfere with how the protein structures respond to heat. That means it can mute the flavors and aromas that “some people maybe want to have that extra boost of, to have the flavor of that cheese really, really coming through.”  

Bottom line:

If you want maximum cheese flavor, optimum meltiness, and a satisfying stretch, you should grate off the block rather than buy the bag of pre-shredded cheese.

Why opt for pre-shredded cheddar at all? Allen can name a few good reasons, chiefly the “big convenience factor.” 

“When you’re in a hurry, or when you’re adding it to a casserole or a taco dish and there are so many other flavors, it’s really just a slight muting,” she says. “Most people aren’t cheese judges, looking for those small nuances. It’s easy to portion out and to use very fast, versus the chunk block, which you have to slice and measure out appropriately.”

Depending on your preferences, pre-grated cheese might have one more advantage over the block: aesthetics. Allen noted that while testing anticaking agents, her team found the starch system tended to brown more when heated. So if you’re aiming for a toasty look, don’t fear the shreds.