Hoop cheese is a traditional cow's milk cheese that was common in the

Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...

from the early to mid 1900s. It is still available today, although it is much less common. It is a simple cheese prepared by separating the whey from curds. Today, the American Dairy Association has no criteria in place to classify hoop cheese, although it has sometimes been referred to as a type of

pot cheese Pot cheese is a type of soft, crumbly, unaged cheese. It is very simple to make and also highly versatile, making it a very popular cheese, but it may be hard to find in stores. Pot cheese is in the midway stage between cottage cheese and farmer ...

Overview

Hoop cheese is a simple, traditional fresh cow's milk cheese, prepared by pressing

curds Curd is obtained by coagulating milk in a sequential process called curdling. It can be a final dairy product or the first stage in cheesemaking. The coagulation can be caused by adding rennet or any edible acidic substance such as lemon ...

until the

whey Whey is the liquid remaining after milk has been curdled and strained. It is a byproduct of the manufacturing of cheese or casein and has several commercial uses. Sweet whey is a byproduct resulting from the manufacture of rennet types of hard ...

is entirely pressed-out, leaving the final cheese product. This involves the use of a cheese hoop, which consists of a ring with both of the ends opened, which is used to press out and separate the whey from the completed cheese, typically using

cheesecloth Cheesecloth is a loose-woven gauze-like carded cotton cloth used primarily in cheesemaking and cooking. Grades Cheesecloth is available in at least seven different grades, from open to extra-fine weave. Grades are distinguished by the numbe ...

, whereby the whey drains out through the cloth and the hoop cheese remains atop. Using this preparation method, the cheese is typically pressed into rounds and then wrapped in cheesecloth or parchment paper or sealed in wax. Hoop cheese has been described as a "truly low-fat" product. It has a firm, but not hard, consistency, and has been described as being similar to

farmer cheese In the United States, farmer cheese (also farmer's cheese or farmers' cheese) is pressed curds, an unripened cheese made by adding rennet and bacterial starter to coagulate and acidify milk. Farmer cheese may be made from the milk of cows, sh ...

and as having a creamy texture. In contemporary times, it is sometimes packaged with a coating of red wax. Hoop cheese can be difficult to find commercially in some areas of the United States, due to the difficulty of automating the manufacturing process and because it has a short

shelf life Shelf life is the length of time that a commodity may be stored without becoming unfit for use, consumption, or sale. In other words, it might refer to whether a commodity should no longer be on a pantry shelf (unfit for use), or no longer on a ...

. It used to be a common cheese product in the Southern United States in the early to mid 1900s. Today, it can still be found at some roadside stands, small restaurants, grocers, farmers markets and independent gas stations in the Southern United States.

Classification

Today, the

American Dairy Association The American Dairy Association is a registered name owned by Dairy Management Inc., which also owns the names ''National Dairy Council'' and ''U.S. Dairy Export Council''. The National Dairy Council website offers a collection of educational materi ...

has no criteria or standards in place to define what specifically constitutes hoop cheese. A 1915 Department Reports of the State of New York entry characterized hoop cheese as a type of

History

As an example of its commercial production, hoop cheese was mass-produced in the 1910s in Otsego County, New York and shipped along with farmer cheese to New York on the

New York Central Railroad The New York Central Railroad was a railroad primarily operating in the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The railroad primarily connected greater New York and Boston in the east with Chicago and St. Louis in the Midw ...

. During this time period hoop and farmer cheeses were packed in cans and boxes in 100-pound increments. Hoop cheese was also packed for commercial transport in this manner through the 1920s in New York state. Hoop cheese was once so common that a device called a hoop cheese cutter was manufactured and used in general stores during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The hoop cheese cutter was patented in 1905 in the United States and resembled a turntable with a knife blade suspended above it. It was built by scale companies of the period to cut to order the exact amount of cheese a customer wanted.

Similar foods

Hoop cheese is different from farmer cheese in that farmer cheese is made with

milk Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digestion, digest solid food. Immune factors and immune ...

cream Cream is a dairy product composed of the higher-fat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, the fat, which is less dense, eventually rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream, this process ...

, and

salt Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quantitie ...

, while hoop cheese is made from milk alone.

Notes

References

External links

Hoop Cheese
Cook's Info.
Hoop Cheese
Vaya.in.
The Computing Cheese Cutter
Bobpritchett.com. {{american cheeses American cheeses Cow's-milk cheeses