New dairy-free soy-free cheese alternative
Posted on April 6th, 2010 by alison
There is a new dairy-free soy-free cheese called Daiya that is just hitting shelves! I like this one better than others I have tried. Does it taste just like real cheese? No — did you really expect otherwise? But it tastes pretty good and it melts!
The vegan cheese is available in Cheddar Style Shreds and Mozarella Style Shreds, and the front of the package says “Melts & Stretches.”
The ingredients of the Mozarella Style are:
Filtered water, tapioca and/or arrowroot flours, non-GMO expeller pressed canola and or non-GMO expeller pressed safflower oil, coconut oil, pea protein, salt, vegan natural flavors, inactive yeast, vegetable glycerin, sunflower lecithin, calcium citrate, xanthan gum, citric acid (for flavor), vegan bacterial cultures.
It is gluten-free and soy-free and made in a facility free of animal products, milk, egg, soy and nuts.
Just because it is available doesn’t mean that I think people should be eating non-dairy cheese on everything, BUT it is nice to put on a kid’s pizza (especially at a birthday party where they want to fit in!) or in a quesadilla or in mac & cheese.
In fact, Amy’s Kitchen has a new gluten-free dairy-free soy-free Rice Macaroni with Non-Dairy Cheeze that is using Daiya cheese! Also, in the San Francisco Bay Area, Amici’s East Coast Pizzeria uses it as their vegan cheese option on all their pizzas (they also have a gluten-free crust!)
Where can you find the new cheese? Here is a list of locations on the Daiya website. I found both the Daiya cheese and the Amy’s frozen mac & cheese at Whole Foods.
Looking for other dairy-free soy-free alternatives? Try these:
Dairy-free soy-free butter
Dairy-free soy-free shortening
Dairy-free soy-free yogurt
Dairy-free soy-free rice cheese
Dairy-free soy-free ice cream
Dairy-free soy-free ice cream (another one)
I have been buying Daiya brand cheese for the last couple of months, and I really do like it. It does melt, although it doesn’t melt the same as real cheese does, but it does have a nice taste, and a great mouth feel. It doesn’t feel or taste weird like some alternative cheeses do. As a bonus, you can freeze it once without it affecting taste or texture, but if you buy a big block of it and decide to grate or slice it, do it before freezing, because afterward, it will crumble if you try to do anything with it. I learned that the hard way! It didn’t affect what I was doing, since I was just using it on pasta, so no harm done. All in all, I like the cheese, and with dairy allergies it is one that I can eat and enjoy. My husband is not allergic to dairy, but he also enjoyed it. The other nice thing about it is that it doesn’t stick to utensils and plates like plastic, as some of them do. I found that I could easily rinse it off, even after the plates had been sitting out for a few hours.
I had a gluten and dairy free pizza at Whole Foods where I live. They use the Daiya cheese - I was not impressed. Trader Joe’s has a goat’s milk mozz that I prefer for my “pizzas” instead since I can’t have cow dairy, but can have goat or sheep.
Great tips Mari! So I suppose I could make a gluten-free crust and freeze it with the cheese on it!
I love goat cheese and try to have that over cow’s milk. But for someone allergic to all forms of dairy, at least there is something!
This is exciting news for my family. I’ve called all of the local WF and finally found one that has it. I hope to pick it up in the next day or so and make a pizza with cheese!
Diane,
Let me know what you think!