A cheese ball is an American hors d'oeuvre that is a type of cheese spread. It first appeared in the 1940s, fell out of fashion, and then had a resurgence in popularity in the 21st century.
A cheese ball is an American hors d'oeuvre that is a type of cheese spread. It first appeared in the 1940s, fell out of fashion, and then had a resurgence in popularity in the 21st century.
The cheese ball is typically made from grated hard cheese and softened cream cheese, sometimes with some sort of binder such as mayonnaise; the mixture is shaped, chilled to resolidify, and often rolled in nuts, seeds, or herbs to provide a decorative finish. [1] [2] It is often served with crackers or crudites at holiday parties in the United States. [3] [4] [5]
Cheese balls are sometimes formed into wheels or logs rather than balls or shaped and decorated to represent a variety of items such as owls or pineapples. [1] [6] [7]
The dish is representative of mid-20th century US cuisine. [8] According to Splendid Table the first recipe appeared in a 1944 cookbook by Virginia Safford, a "wildly popular columnist" for the Minneapolis Star Journal . [8] [9]
The dish fell out of fashion for a period; by the late 1980s the term "cheeseball" was synonymous with "lacking style, taste, or originality". [10] According to Amanda Hesser, writing for the New York Times in 2003, it "tend[s] to be associated with shag rugs and tinsel, symbols of the middle-class middlebrow". [2] Kim Severson, writing for The New York Times in 2016, said it was "the culinary equivalent of a Rorschach test". [7]
Amy Sedaris and her brother David wrote a play, The Book of Liz, that focussed on cheese balls as a metaphor for "the cliches we all live by", according to Ben Brantley. [7] [11] She included a recipe in her 2006 cookbook, Hosting a Party Under the Influence, and in 2007 made a version on the Martha Stewart Show, which according to Severson, "elevated cheese ball kitsch to an art form". [12] [7] [13] According to Splendid Table's Jennifer Russell, writing in 2014, "Sedaris may be singlehandedly responsible for the cheese ball's revival." [8] In 2014 Culture, an industry magazine, said "cheese balls are making their comeback". [12] MplsStPaul Magazine called 2016 "the year of the cheese ball", calling the dish "the North’s answer to Southern pimento cheese". [7] [9]
Amanda Hesser is an American food writer, editor, cookbook author and entrepreneur. Most notably, she was the food editor of The New York Times Magazine, the editor of T Living, a quarterly publication of The New York Times, author of The Essential New York Times Cookbook which was a New York Times bestseller, and co-founder and CEO of Food52.
Amy Louise Sedaris is an American actress, comedian, and writer. Most recently, she has appeared in both The Mandalorian (2019–2023) and The Book of Boba Fett (2022) as Peli Motto. She played Jerri Blank in the Comedy Central comedy series Strangers with Candy (1999–2000) and the prequel film Strangers with Candy (2005), which she also wrote.
Macaroni and cheese is a dish of macaroni and a cheese sauce, most commonly cheddar sauce.
Fettuccine Alfredo is an Italian-style pasta dish that originated in Rome in the 1920s, which is now a well known staple of Italian-American cuisine. In its original form, it is made with fettuccine, butter, and Parmesan cheese. As the cheese is mixed with freshly cooked, warm fettuccine and ample butter, it melts and emulsifies to form a smooth, rich cheese sauce coating the noodles. Cream is commonly added to Italian-American versions, which are often served as a main course with chicken, shrimp, salmon or other ingredients on top or on the side.
A soufflé is a baked egg dish originating in France in the early 18th century. Combined with various other ingredients, it can be served as a savoury main dish or sweetened as a dessert. The word soufflé is the past participle of the French verb souffler, which means to blow, breathe, inflate or puff.
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Ruth Reichl, is an American chef, food writer and editor. In addition to two decades as a food critic, mainly spent at the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times, Reichl has also written cookbooks, memoirs and a novel, and has been co-producer of PBS's Gourmet's Diary of a Foodie, culinary editor for the Modern Library, host of PBS's Gourmet's Adventures With Ruth, and editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine. She has won six James Beard Foundation Awards.
Kofta is a family of meatball or meatloaf dishes found in Balkan, Middle Eastern, North African, South Caucasian, South Asian and Central Asian cuisines. In the simplest form, koftas consist of balls of minced meat – usually beef, chicken, pork, lamb or mutton, or a mixture – mixed with spices and sometimes other ingredients. The earliest known recipes are found in early Arab cookbooks and call for ground lamb.
Cheese spread is a soft spreadable cheese or processed cheese product. Various additional ingredients are sometimes used, such as multiple cheeses, fruits, vegetables and meats, and many types of cheese spreads exist. Pasteurized process cheese spread is a type of cheese spread prepared using pasteurized processed cheese and other ingredients.
Mì Quảng, literally "Quảng noodles", is a Vietnamese noodle dish that originated from Quảng Nam Province in central Vietnam. In the region, it is one of the most popular and nationally recognized food items, and is served on various occasions such as at family parties, death anniversaries, and Tết.
Pimento cheese is a spread typically made of cheese, mayonnaise, and pimentos and is typically served on crackers and vegetables or in sandwiches.
A Dutch baby pancake, sometimes called a German pancake, a Bismarck, a Dutch puff, Hooligan, or a Hootenanny, is a dish that is similar to a large Yorkshire pudding.
Spinach salad is a salad with spinach as its main ingredient. In the US, a version dressed in a hot bacon dressing which slightly wilts the spinach was popular in the 1970s and into the 1980s and has been called the classic version.
La bonne cuisine de Madame E. Saint-Ange is a French cookbook written by Marie Ébrard under the name E. Saint-Ange and published in 1927 by Larousse. A "classic text of French home cooking", it is a highly detailed work documenting the cuisine bourgeoise of early 20th century France, including technical descriptions of the kitchen equipment of the day.
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Candle salad is a vintage fruit salad that was popular in America from the 1920s through to the 1960s. The salad is typically composed of lettuce, pineapple, banana, cherry, and either mayonnaise or, according to some recipes, cottage cheese. Whipped cream may also be used. The ingredients are assembled to resemble a lit candle.
Denise Landis is a British-born American food writer, editor, cookbook author, and recipe tester and developer. She was a recipe tester for The New York Times for over twenty-five years. She is the founder and CEO of the international food community for professional chefs and passionate home cooks, The Cook's Cook, LLC, with a website and free community registration at TheCooksCook.com.
Melissa Clark is an American food writer, cookbook author and New York Times columnist. She is the author of over 40 cookbooks and has received multiple awards from the James Beard Foundation and IACP for her work. Clark is a regular guest on television series such as Today show, Rachael Ray and Iron Chef America and on radio programmes such as The Splendid Table on NPR and The Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC.
Vegetable Kingdom: The Abundant World of Vegan Recipes, often shortened to Vegetable Kingdom, is a 2020 cookbook by Bryant Terry. It received positive reviews and won an NAACP Image Award. Recipes are based on the cuisines of the African diaspora. The book provides a song pairing for each dish.
The Essential New York Times Cookbook is a cookbook published by W. W. Norton & Company and authored by former The New York Times food editor Amanda Hesser. The book was originally published in October 2010 and contains over 1,400 recipes from the past 150 years in The New York Times, all of which were tested by Hesser and her assistant, Merrill Stubbs, prior to the book's publication. The book has recipes dating from the mid 1850s, when The New York Times first began publishing topics about food and recipes.