Cheese is, in my view, one of the underrated snack foods. In most cases more of a salty or savory snack than a sweet one, cheese is simple and tasty. For people more sophisticated than me, cheeses also pair nicely with wine.
Aldi’s everyday cheese lineup has exploded in size over the last few years. At one time, I would have spotted just the basics, like shredded cheese, your garden variety slices, and a few blocks. Now the grocer stocks everything from fan favorite string cheese to fancy wedges. Aldi’s cheese game is big, and that doesn’t even count the limited time Aldi Finds that the store rotates into the collection, like its Advent calendars.
Not long ago, we sighted a couple of kinds of cheese cubes we hadn’t seen before. Since we’re always ready to try out the Aldi cheese scene, we picked them both up.
Emporium Selection New York Extra Sharp White Cheddar Cheese Cubes and Emporium Selection Rich and Creamy Gouda Cheese Cubes are both Aldi Regular Buys. You can find them both in stores all the time, in the refrigerated cheese section.
At the time of this post, both of these varieties come in 8-ounce bags and currently cost $2.99. That comes out to around 37 cents an ounce.
Emporium Selection New York Extra Sharp White Cheddar Cheese Cubes
These cheese cubs are marketed as “extra sharp.” They are sharp, although we didn’t think they had quite the same level of bite that we see in some other sharp cheeses. Still, it fits the bill if you’re looking for something beyond mild.
The ingredients are simple — pasteurized milk, cheese culture, salt, and microbial enzymes — and the cheese is quite high in saturated fat (5 grams), along with modest amounts of sodium and cholesterol. Milk, obviously, is a potential allergen.
White Cheddar nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
Emporium Selection Rich and Creamy Gouda Cheese Cubes
These cubes are, as advertised, a milder and smoother cheese. This is definitely a cheese that you would turn to if you’re looking for something with less bite.
These cubes are mostly similar in ingredients to the sharp cheddar, with pasteurized milk, cheese culture, salt, microbial enzymes, and one other ingredient, annatto, which is a vegetable-based coloring agent. Also as with the cheddar, these are high in saturated fat (5 grams) and have modest amounts of cholesterol and sodium. Milk, again, is an allergen.
Rich and Creamy Gouda nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
The Verdict:
These two cheese cube bags do mostly what they claim to do. They offer a couple of variations on cheese — one sharp, the other mild and smooth — that fit whatever you need them for. They taste as expected and are worth looking at if you need cheese cubes like these.
