We Taste-Tested 8 Brands of Cheddar Cheese Singles on Cheeseburgers—Here Are Our Favorites

The prompt for this taste test sparked wild debate across our team, particularly around what cheese belongs on burgers to begin with. After two hours (!) of back and forth (we are nothing here at Serious Eats if not unfailingly thorough), we…didn’t even reach a consensus. How could we have slept soundly that night knowing we’d declared American cheese—the gummy-but-meltier option—correct? How could we have shown our faces in the kitchens the next day had we instead ratified cheddar—the objectively better-tasting but inferior-melting selection—as the winner?

So we didn’t. But because Kenji did this exercise with American cheese quite some time ago and because we all just wanted to eat a fair amount of cheese, we went the cheddar route. Little did we know, it wouldn’t be an entirely American cheese-less day. 

You know the shtick: The SE team pulled together eight brands of cheddar cheese slices you’re likely to find in your local supermarket and methodically, empirically, scientifically! tasted its way through them all in a quest to identify the very best one to put atop all your forthcoming cheeseburgers. We had a blast! We needed to take a few deep breaths and a few long walks! We all took a lot of grease-tinged pictures of piles of cheese!

(I have no skin in this game; I love cheeseburgers, but I sat in the corner taking meticulous reaction notes and enjoying three slices of what ultimately became Genevieve’s strawberry rhubarb pie. Enjoy!)

The Criteria

Cheddar cheese for cheeseburgers needs to be tangy and sharp. Like, sharp and distinct enough that you could eat it as a standalone snack without having to wonder what you just ate. It should also be just salty enough that once you’re done with said snack, you shouldn’t immediately need water—you should just kinda want a few sips. 

The addition of heat should not mitigate the integrity or flavor of the cheese (see: slices should converge to evenly coat the patty; it should not create any kind of sideways cheese drippings that require you to remove a hand from your burger to catch or clean). Proper meltability also means there are no non-melted sections of the slice that eat dryly. Mid-slice stretch is important, too! A few bites per burger should yield a fine, thin string of cheese that breaks gently of its own accord. Finally, there shouldn’t be much slick cheese grease. Grease is best as a patty’s thing! We added two slices of each cheese to each burger for the best gauging of flavor and meltability. 

While we didn’t ultimately include a color criterion, we just for funsies verbally agreed that orange cheddar felt more correct in this context.

Overall Winner

Tillamook Sharp Cheddar

The only cheese among the contenders to be unanimously described as having a “distinct cheddar flavor.” Some called it “nice,” others called it “very nice,” one called it “really nice,” and so on and so forth. In fact, Daniel declared, if flavor is most important to you when choosing a cheddar for cheeseburgers, Tillamook’s should be your top choice. Jake whooped when he learned it’d been his top pick. He is to Tillamook cheddar as Genevieve is to Häagen-Dazs strawberry ice cream, I suppose.

Runner-Up

Kraft Singles Sharp Cheddar

Listen. Just listen! These slices sat there and took endless admonishment from the team before a single member had even taken a bite. “Psh,” they scoffed. “We know exactly what this is,” they huffed. “OBVIOUSLY KRAFT AMERICAN CHEESE SINGLES,” they pooh-poohed. They then promptly gave the stuff near-top numbers for both flavor and meltability. They took note of the glorious, thick coating and its unequivocal nostalgic yumminess when paired with meat, all while attempting to disqualify the cheese’s participation in the ranking because they were so convinced it really was an American cheese entry snuck in. Maybe it was? (It’s not quite, but it’s not not. Kraft cheddar goes a little heavier on whey and has fewer preservatives than its American counterpart childhood dream-stuff does. Daniel says this doesn’t matter.) Regardless, ya know, if color or congealment over time had been a consideration, you’d be reading a different set of rankings.

The Contenders

• 365 by Whole Foods Market Sharp Cheddar Cheese Slices
• Applegate Naturals Medium Cheddar Cheese Slices
• Boar’s Head Vermont White Cheddar Cheese Slices
• Cracker Barrel Wisconsin Extra Sharp Yellow Cheddar
• Kraft Singles Sharp Cheddar Cheese Slices
• Sargento Creamery Sliced Cheddar Cheese
• Stop & Shop Sharp Cheddar Cheese Slices
• Tillamook Farmstyle Sharp Cheddar Cheese Slices

Key Takeaways and Conclusion

Our winner contains just four ingredients: cultured milk, salt, enzymes, and annatto (a food coloring derived from achiote that is frequently used to give orange cheese its color). Our runner-up, on the other hand, has a bevy of preservatives and flavor enhancers, including maltodextrin, lactic acid, and sorbic acid. All this to say: Though our editors prefer cheddar slices that have a distinct cheesiness and tang, they aren’t immune to the charms of processed cheese with great meltability. 

Our Testing Methodology

All taste tests are conducted with brands completely hidden and without discussion. Tasters taste samples in random order. For example, taster A may taste sample one first, while taster B will taste sample six first. This is to prevent palate fatigue from unfairly giving any one sample an advantage. Tasters are asked to fill out tasting sheets ranking the samples for various criteria. All data is tabulated and results are calculated with no editorial input in order to give us the most impartial representation of actual results possible.