New to veganism and looking for vegan cheese alternatives? We have a catalogue of nearly 1000 dairy free vegan cheeses right here at VeganCheese.co and there is bound to be a number of fantastic plant based cheeses for you to discover.
Whether you're looking for dairy free cheeses, as you have not made the change to veganism or you're looking for a friend, there will be cheeses similar to your old favourites as well as new tastes and textures to discover in the world of vegan cheese.
You will find alternatives to absolutely every cheese type and further down we look at some of these types and what options you have.
You don't have to worry that you won't be able to find a nice semi-hard vegan cheddar or a camembert to replace for your cheese and wine evenings, there is a vegan cheese alternative for everyone and every occasion.
Why Choose Vegan Cheese Alternatives
There are many reasons to try vegan cheese alternatives, here are just a few we went vegan and gave vegan cheese alternatives a go.
New Food Journey
It is an entirely new food journey, there is a huge adventure of new food that awaits your taste buds.
You'll hear most people say vegan food is bland, but guarantee'd, these people haven't tried more than one or two options nor tasted vegan food that has been lovingly created from plants by some amazing vegan chefs.
You will discover that you can create more from less, but you'll also find you're eating plants, nuts, seeds and more food types that you didn't really consider before.
For The Animals
Animals are the whole reason veganism exists, and demanding dairy and animal based cheeses, even vegetarian cheeses results in animals being directly harmed.
Here are a few ways the dairy industry works:
- Cows and other animals used for milk for cheese are insemenated repeatedly from about 12 months of age so that they can keep making milk
- Bulls have electro-ejaculators placed in their rectum so that semen can be collected
- Baby cows are immediately taken from their mother
- Mother cows are stressed due to this for days, if not longer
- If the baby is male, they are killed and if female, they follow the same horrible existence as their mother
For The Environment
The environmental impact of animal milk for dairy cheese is huge, compared to that of plant milks and nuts used in most vegan cheeses is just a fraction of the environmental impact.
There are some amazing studies which show just how bad animal products and milk are for the environment.
"For example, a low-impact litre of cow’s milk uses almost two times as much land and creates almost double the emissions as an average litre of soymilk."
Which is taken from the largest study ever on farming across the globe: https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2018-06-01-new-estimates-environmental-cost-f… It has a fantastic visualisation of what food types are causing most harm:
As you can see, dairy cheese and cows milk create magnitudes more greenhouse gas emissions in comparison to nuts and soymilk. As well as having worse acidification, eutrophocation and land use.
If you want to give veganism a go for the environment, the proof and facts are all around us and here you can see that for yourself.
The study and others dig deeper and go in to different types of nuts and plant milk in comparison to dairy milk and cheese, with the BBC creating a "which milk should I buy" to help the environment: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-46654042
You can see this in a visual comparison here:
As you can see, all plant based milks are far better for the environment and even almond milk, which is used as a scapegoat for it's water use by non-vegans.
It is in fact better across the board and in terms of emissions, land use and even water use, which it uses just over half that of cows milk but uses less than 10% of the land and produces 3/4 less emissions for the same 200ml glass.
And almond milk is seen as the worst for the environment, when in fact, it is magnitudes better in comparison to dairy milk.
Alternatives to Dairy Cheeses
If like us, you struggle with removing dairy cheese and animal based cheeses from your diet, you're in for a treat.
Since we went vegan and removed dairy and other animal products we couldn't be happier and so are the animals.
You may find a few dairy free cheeses that you don't enjoy, but isn't that the same for all new foods that you try, some you love and some you hate.
With nearly 1000 options for dairy free cheese, you're bound to find something you just love.
Types of Alternatives
Further down you will see alternatives and many different cheese family types to look in to, we don't cover all but the few we do are:
- Vegan alternatives to cheddar cheese
- Vegan alternatives to brie
- Vegan alternatives to mozzarella cheese
- Vegan alternatives to parmesan hard cheese
- Vegan alternatives to camembert
- Whole food plant based cheeses made solely from whole food plants
