What are the best brands of American cheese?

Local. Every region has superb producers who are difficult to source elsewhere.

Some great producers that do have good distribution: Cowgirl Creamery, Cypress Grove, Maytag Blue, Jasper Hill, Uplands, Cuba (the last is about an hour from here and has superb aged cheddar- I always have the 5 and 15 year on hand).

Groceries like HEB in Texas and Fry's in Arizona have great cheese sections- look for any store featuring Murray's.

Fry's is Kroger's name in Arizona.

I have had mixed experiences with Murray's. Kroger and Tom Thumb (Albertson's name in Dallas) went heavy on Murray's a couple of years back.

CD
 
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CD
 
Kroger and H-E-B have "cheese shops," in addition to the national brand cheeses in the dairy section.
Kroger's are actually rather amazing. Loads of choice, even in a "small" supermarket like Madeira (OH). There's a ginormous Kroger's somewhere near Cinci where the cheese counter is excellent. Great selection of French, Swiss, British, Italian and American cheeses. I could probably spend all day there because there's a wine bar right next to it...
 
Kroger's are actually rather amazing. Loads of choice, even in a "small" supermarket like Madeira (OH). There's a ginormous Kroger's somewhere near Cinci where the cheese counter is excellent. Great selection of French, Swiss, British, Italian and American cheeses. I could probably spend all day there because there's a wine bar right next to it...

If you like Kroger, you would love H-E-B. Imagine Kroger, with an even bigger selection.

CD
 
What I refuse to buy is (a) ready sliced cheese and (b) ready grated cheese. The only exception is burgers. Gotta have some sliced Swiss on my burger.
I’m the same, mostly. I buy sliced for sandwiches, or if I have a coupon, like two-for-one packages.

I hate pre-shredded cheeses, but I do buy them, because none of my local shops (meaning specifically the ones in Wilmington) sell certain cheeses in blocks (like whole milk mozzarella), so in a pinch, I’ll buy those, but I usually wait until the weekend, when I’m at a larger Kroger, or the gourmet shop, or Jungle Jim’s, and then get my block cheeses there.
 
Ok, CD posted cheese from a larger Kroger (a Kroger Marketplace, I assume) - I’m posting from a standard/regular Kroger, the one in my hometown:

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Started off with the deli case - just the standard stuff (American, Colby, etc).


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On to some specialty pre-cut stuff, for easy snacking. Also not much of a variety.


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More specialty cheeses, like that one with merlot mixed in, and a couple brought in from their specialty line (Murray’s) - still not a lot of variety.


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The remainder of the specialty case.

More to follow…
 
More Kroger:

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Ok, I lied. This is the rest of the specialty case.


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This is some Mexican stuff. Something that aggravated me about Kroger…as you can tell, keep cheese in three distinct places in the store. I knew they had the Mexican stuff, but I had to go ask, because they’d moved it from another cheese aisle to a place over by the eggs. 🤷‍♂️


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This would be their…nonspecialty cheese, I guess. It’s also where the sliced and shredded cheeses are, but I didn’t snap those.


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I ended up buying this because it’s a new item. ALDI sells a cheddar-Gruyère blend that I’ve had, so we’ll see how this compares. This cost $2.99US.

Sometime in the next couple of days, I’ll get to the gourmet shop and post that.
 
I’m the same, mostly. I buy sliced for sandwiches, or if I have a coupon, like two-for-one packages.

I hate pre-shredded cheeses, but I do buy them, because none of my local shops (meaning specifically the ones in Wilmington) sell certain cheeses in blocks (like whole milk mozzarella), so in a pinch, I’ll buy those, but I usually wait until the weekend, when I’m at a larger Kroger, or the gourmet shop, or Jungle Jim’s, and then get my block cheeses there.

I believe Kroger sells a Boar's Head mozzarella that is whole milk at the Deli counter. They will slice of a block for you, if you ask. I do that when I am buying cheese to cold smoke. I just ask them to slice off a 1-inch block of whatever I want. Some Deli workers may look at you funny, but they'll do it.

CD
 
Ok, CD posted cheese from a larger Kroger (a Kroger Marketplace, I assume) - I’m posting from a standard/regular Kroger, the one in my hometown:

Nope. That's the regular Kroger nearest my house. The Kroger Marketplace in Frisco has a slightly larger cheese shop, but my regular Kroger has a good stock of cheeses.

CD
 
Nope. That's the regular Kroger nearest my house. The Kroger Marketplace in Frisco has a slightly larger cheese shop, but my regular Kroger has a good stock of cheeses.

CD
Take a look at that first pic I posted of Kroger today - that’s the entire cheese inventory for the deli.

I’d also like to point out, that’s expanded from what it used to be before they remodeled about three years ago. It used to be smaller than that, and we didn’t have any of that specialty cheese at all.
 
Take a look at that first pic I posted of Kroger today - that’s the entire cheese inventory for the deli.

I’d also like to point out, that’s expanded from what it used to be before they remodeled about three years ago. It used to be smaller than that, and we didn’t have any of that specialty cheese at all.

It is probably location. Frisco has a population of 200,000, and is a relatively affluent city. I just did a search, and according to Wikipedia, Wilmington, Ohio has about 12,000 population. Regular Kroger stores in larger suburbs of Cincy may have cheese shops like the ones in Frisco.

CD
 
It is probably location. Frisco has a population of 200,000, and is a relatively affluent city.
Yeah, we’re 12,000, mostly split between farmers and drug addicts…and there’s actually space between us and the next town in any direction - miles and miles of farmland. It’s not the suburbs, where one 20,000-person town butts right up next to a 15,000-person town, and you can’t tell where one stops and the other starts.

Notice in that deli case…there’s about five different blocks of American cheese (white, yellow, sharp and two makers, I think) - that’s like half the cheese! :laugh:
 
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