Cream cheese is a soft, usually mild-tasting fresh cheese made from milk and cream. Cream cheese is not naturally matured and is meant to be consumed fresh, so it differs from other soft cheeses, such as Brie and Neufchâtel. It is more comparable in taste, texture, and production methods to Boursin and mascarpone. Stabilizers, such as carob bean gum and carrageenan, are often added in industrial production. It can also come in several flavors.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration defines cream cheese as containing at least 33% milk fat with a moisture content of not more than 55%, and a pH range of 4.4 to 4.9. Similarly, under Canadian Food and Drug Regulations, cream cheese must contain at least 30% milk fat and a maximum of 55% moisture. In other countries, it is defined differently and may need a considerably higher fat content.
Cream cheese originated in the United States in the 1870s.
Origin
Around 1873, William A. Lawrence, a dairyman in Chester, New York, was the first to mass produce an unripened fresh cheese known generically as cream cheese. In 1872, he began manufacturing a Neufchâtel cheese style. By adding cream to the process, he developed a richer cheese that he called "cream cheese". In 1877, Lawrence created the first brand of cream cheese; its logo was a silhouette of a cow followed by the words "Neufchatel & Cream Cheese".
In 1879, to build a larger factory, Lawrence entered into an arrangement with Samuel S. Durland, another Chester merchant. Histories that imply the cheese was produced in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, or Philadelphia, New York, are incorrect. the pH of the blend decreases (acidifies). Amino acids at the surface of the proteins begin losing charge and become neutral, turning the fat micelles from hydrophilic to hydrophobic state and causing the liquid to coagulate. If the bacteria are left in the milk too long, the pH lowers further, the micelles attain a positive charge, and the mixture returns to liquid form. The key, then, is to kill the bacteria by heating the mixture to at the moment the cheese is at the isoelectric point, meaning the state at which half the ionizable surface amino acids of the proteins are positively charged and half are negative.
Inaccurate timing of the heating can produce inferior or unsalable cheese due to variations in flavor and texture. Cream cheese has a higher fat content than other cheeses, and fat repels water, which tends to separate from the cheese; this can be avoided in commercial production by adding stabilizers, such as guar or carob gums, to prolong its shelf life.
Cream cheese is easy to make at home, and many methods and recipes are used. Consistent, reliable, commercial manufacture is more difficult.
American cream cheese tends to have lower fat content than elsewhere, but "Philadelphia" branded cheese is suggested as a substitute for petit suisse by Julia Child.
See also
- List of spreads