I've had my eye on Great Midwest's Mango Fire cheddar at Sam's Club for a while now, where it's a staple in the ever-changing cheese case.
Great Midwest is a Wisconsin cheese company that concentrates on blended flavored cheddar and Jack cheeses. Its website states that it uses only cheeses made from Wisconsin milk from cows that have not been treated with hormones.
Mango Fire cheddar is a creamy pale yellow cheese with obvious pieces of orange chili embedded in the paste. DCI Cheese, Great Midwest Cheese's parent company, explained its method of manufacture. It is a blended cheese, so the flavorings are incorporated into ground cheddar cheese after it has matured; then the product is pressed back into wheel or block form and cut for sale. These types of cheeses are very popular in England, and taste more "honest" than the processed flavored cheeses we usually see here in the states, which are actually melted and combined with lots of gums and stabilizers before being re-formed. It looks like blended cheeses are gaining a foothold with American manufacturers as well.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: Evansville Courier & Press
