One of the nice perks of working in an upscale grocery store is that there is a gourmet cheese case, chock full of amazing cheeses that tempt me each time I walk by. The giant wheels of cheese come in and are cut down to size, often leaving behind smaller pieces that are then wrapped and placed in the ‘Bargain Bin’ where lucky shoppers can grab as many artisan cheeses as they want, often for only a few dollars per piece. It’s nice way to try out a wide variety of good cheese, without committing to a large piece that you may not like.

Once in a while I like to purchase two or three of the small chunks and take them home to savor with a glass of wine and some good crackers. I do like cheese, despite having mild lactose intolerance. It seems that the artisan cheeses, made with higher quality milk don’t tend to disagree with my belly like more mass-produced cheeses can. Recently I was given an opportunity to compare Sargento Natural Cheese slices to that of processed cheese. Hah. No brainer there. Bring on the cheese!!!

The cheese arrived during a busy crush time in my schedule, and languished in the fridge for a few days before I pulled it out to taste the offerings. Griffin and I bent over the cheeses, examining them closely. There were plain plastic wrapped slices, likely Kraft singles, which we’ve never eaten and truthfully, we just tossed those out. We don’t need to eat plastic cheese to know that it’s disgusting. The package of Sargento cheese was neatly sliced in perfect squares and was real, honest to goodness cheese. It looked, smelled and felt like real cheese, all in perfect sandwich sized squares in a neatly wrapped package. There were about 12-14 slices in the package. I don’t know what the retail cost of the item would be.

We both detected a somewhat plastic taste to the cheese from the wrapper, no doubt, but beyond that, this was unmistakenly ‘cheese’. We broke up the slices and ate them with some crackers, enjoying the quick snack and chatting aimlessly. I don’t tend to buy cheese in this form, preferring to purchase bricks that I can either slice or shred to my needs. This cheese, however, was flavorful and easy to use, and much much better than the individually processed fake stuff. Although my preference for cheese goes to a bit higher level than this, I did enjoy those slices, especially lingering over them with my boy, sharing a quick conversation.

Are you a cheese lover? What’s your favorite type of cheese??