We’ve picked products we think vegan cheese’ll love and may earn commission from links on this page. Read about why you can trust BBC Good Food reviews. With more people than ever following a vegan diet, demand for plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy products continues to grow.
These days you can find dairy-free alternatives to all kinds of cheese varieties, made from a wide range of different plant-based ingredients such as coconut oil, soy and nuts. But how do they compare to the real deal? We conducted a blind taste test to find the best vegan alternatives to cheddar, parmesan, mozzarella, feta and cream cheese. By far the most popular of all the entries in this category, our panel were impressed by this cheddar alternative for its creamy taste and crumbly bite. It had the same milk-like smell and lactic acidity of a cheddar cheese and was definitely the closest representative of a block of regular cheddar cheese of them all, although we did feel the flavour was more mild than mature.
This could be eaten alone, on a cracker or in a sandwich. When cooking, it doesn’t melt incredibly well, but we found when using it with other vegan ‘cheeses’ in a sauce that adding a little water to emulsify it was effective. Soft, mild and creamy, this had the slightly milky-tasting sourness needed to mimic cheese, but some of our tasters thought it had an unusual aftertaste. A good level of salt and very subtle mushroom-like smell also led us to believe that this would work well with a mushroom burger.
If you’re looking for a vegan ‘mozzarella’ to use in salads and sandwiches, this is our top choice. It has the creamiest, cheesiest flavour when eaten raw, with a good level of salt. Modified Starch, Starch, Maltodextrin, Sea Salt, Vegan Flavourings, Colour: Natural Beta Carotene, Olive extract, Vitamin B12. A good mozzarella for using on pizzas or in paninis needs to melt into a gooey texture with a bit of stretch. It’s for that reason that we put all the entries in this category on a piece of bread under the grill to see how they acted. This was by far the most mozzarella-like texture when melted and, flavour-wise, it’s mild and agreeable.