String cheese facts for kids
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String cheese is a fun type of cheese that you can pull apart into long strings! It's made in a special way. This process lines up the tiny proteins inside the cheese. When you heat mozzarella cheese to about 60 °C (140 °F) and then stretch it, the milk proteins line up. This is what makes it possible to peel strings or strips from the larger piece of cheese.
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String Cheese Around the World
Central Europe
In Slovakia, there's a type of string cheese called korbáčiky. It's a salty cheese made from sheep milk. You can find it smoked or plain. Traditionally, people make it by hand-pulling steamed sheep's cheese into strings and then braiding them together. Sometimes, it's also made with cow milk.
Eastern Europe and West Asia
In Turkey, a common string cheese is called dil peyniri, which means "tongue cheese." It's a fresh, white cheese made from cow's milk. It comes from the Bilecik and Bursa areas. This cheese becomes even more stringy when it melts.
In Armenia, a traditional string cheese is called chechil. It has a white base. The milk used often comes from older goats or sheep, depending on where it's made. This cheese is flavored with black cumin and mahleb. It is usually sold as a braided, endless loop. The way the cheese is pulled during making helps it form into strings. You can also find this cheese in Syria and Turkey, where many Armenian people live.
In Georgia and Russia, string cheese is known as tenili. It's made from fermented sheep's milk and cream. It is left to age for 60 days in a salted and dried veal stomach.
Western Europe
Cheestrings became a popular snack in the UK and Republic of Ireland after they were first introduced in 1996. They are made from real cheese, not processed cheese, by a company called Kerry Group. Their mascot is a cartoon character named Mr Strings.
Cheestrings are available in Original (which is like mozzarella) and a two-color Twisted type. In the past, there were also cheddar, smoky bacon, and pizza flavors. The pizza flavor was brought back in May 2021 to celebrate Cheestrings' 25th birthday.
Kerry Group also sends Gouda Cheestrings from Charleville, County Cork to Holland. They also send a Gouda and Emmental mix to France, where the product is called Ficello. Other companies like Tesco and Dairylea have made similar low-cost versions.
Kerry Cheestrings also have a product called Attack-A-Snack. This snack comes with a tortilla wrap or cracker, a small packet of tomato ketchup, and a piece of processed ham. It has been available since the late 1990s.
North America
Mexico
In Mexico, the first type of string cheese was created in 1885 by Leobarda Castellanos García when she was 14 years old. A very popular string cheese today is called Quesillo. It is sold in balls of different sizes. It is also known as "Queso Oaxaca" or Oaxaca cheese, named after the place where it was invented. Now, it is popular all over Mexico.
United States
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In the United States, string cheese usually means snack-sized pieces of low-moisture mozzarella. This type of string cheese is shaped like a cylinder, about 6 inches (15 cm) long and less than 1 inch (2.54 cm) wide. People often call it a "cheese stick." These are cut and packaged, either one by one or several in a pack.
The cheese used is almost always a type of mozzarella, or a mix of mozzarella and cheddar. This string cheese gets its name because you can pull strips of cheese from the cylinder along its length. Frank Baker invented it in 1976.
Oceania
In Australia, string cheese is sold by Bega Cheese and is called Bega Stringers. String cheese can also be sold in a can. In the Marquesas Islands, a popular type of string cheese is made from breadfruit proteins and buffalo milk. It is sold under the brand name Sea King String.
