What Is Vegan Cheese Made Of? Ingredients Explained

Whether you're vegan, lactose intolerant, or just curious, you've probably wondered what vegan cheese is actually made from. It looks like cheese. It's sold like cheese. Some of it even melts like cheese. But the ingredients couldn't be more different from the milk, rennet, and cultures that go into the traditional version.

This guide explains exactly what goes into vegan cheese, how it's made, how it compares to dairy cheese nutritionally and in terms of taste, and whether it's actually a healthy choice.

What Is Vegan Cheese?

Vegan cheese is a plant-based alternative to dairy cheese. It's made entirely without animal products - no milk, no cream, no rennet, no whey. Instead, it uses a combination of plant fats, proteins, starches, and flavourings to replicate the taste, texture, and appearance of traditional cheese.

The category covers everything from supermarket slices and grated bags to artisan nut-based wheels that are cultured and aged in a process that closely mirrors traditional cheesemaking. The quality, taste, and ingredient lists vary enormously depending on the brand and style.

In the UK, vegan cheese cannot legally be labelled or marketed as "cheese", it must be described as a "cheese alternative" or similar. This is because terms like "cheese", "milk" and "cream" are protected under UK and EU food labelling regulations and can only be used for products derived from animal milk.

What Is Vegan Cheese Made Of? The Key Ingredients

Vegan cheese ingredients vary widely depending on the product, but most fall into four categories: a base, binders and thickeners, flavourings and sometimes fortification.

Base Ingredients

The base provides the fat and body of the cheese. The most common bases are:

• Coconut oil. The most widely used base in supermarket vegan cheeses. Many brands use coconut oil as a primary ingredient. It gives the cheese a smooth, firm texture and a clean melt. The flavour of the coconut is refined out during processing, so the cheese doesn't taste tropical.
• Cashew nuts. The go-to base for artisan and premium vegan cheeses. Cashews are naturally creamy and high in fat, which makes them ideal for replicating soft cheeses like Brie and Camembert. 
• Almonds. Used alongside or instead of cashews in some artisan cheeses. Almonds add a slightly firmer texture and a subtle nutty flavour.
• Soy. One of the earliest bases used in vegan cheese production. Soy provides protein and structure but has fallen out of favour in some products due to allergen concerns and consumer preference for nut-based alternatives.
• Seeds (sunflower, hemp, watermelon). An increasingly popular allergen-friendly alternative for people who can't eat nuts or soy. Seed-based cheeses are higher in protein and fibre than coconut oil-based versions.
• Rice and potato starch. Used as a base in some allergen-free ranges. Cathedral City Plant-Based uses rice as a key ingredient, making it suitable for people with nut and soy allergies.

Binding and Thickening Agents

These give vegan cheese its structure and help it hold together. Without the natural protein matrix found in dairy cheese (casein), plant-based alternatives need help to achieve a similar texture.

Common thickeners include tapioca starch (which also adds stretchiness), potato starch, agar (a plant-based gelling agent derived from seaweed), carrageenan (another seaweed-derived thickener), and xanthan gum. These are standard food-grade ingredients used across the food industry, not just in vegan cheese.

Flavouring and Fermentation

Getting vegan cheese to taste like cheese is the biggest challenge. Several ingredients are used to create the tangy, savoury, umami flavour profile that people associate with dairy cheese:

• Nutritional yeast. A deactivated yeast that provides a naturally cheesy, savoury flavour along with B vitamins and protein. It's arguably the single most important flavouring ingredient in vegan cheese.
• Lemon juice or apple cider vinegar. Adds acidity and tang, mimicking the sharpness of aged dairy cheese.
• Miso paste. Provides a deep, rich, umami flavour in some premium products.
• Garlic, onion, salt, and natural flavourings. Standard seasoning that rounds out the flavour profile.
• Vegan cultures. The most significant development in recent years. Artisan producers now use bacterial cultures (the same concept used in dairy cheesemaking, but grown on plant-based media) to ferment their cheeses. This creates genuine depth of flavour, complexity, and even aged rinds. 

Fortification

Because vegan cheese doesn't naturally contain the calcium, vitamin B12, or complete proteins found in dairy cheese, many commercial products are fortified. Applewood Vegan, for example, adds calcium and B12 to bring its nutritional profile closer to dairy cheese. Not all brands do this, so it's worth checking the label if nutrition is a priority for you.

How Is Vegan Cheese Made?

The manufacturing process depends on the type of vegan cheese.

For mass-market products (supermarket slices, grated bags, blocks), the process is relatively industrial. Coconut oil is melted and combined with starches, water, flavourings, and emulsifiers. The mixture is heated, blended, and then cooled in moulds to set. The result is a product that slices, grates, and melts in a way that's designed to replicate dairy cheese as closely as possible.

Artisan vegan cheeses follow a process much closer to traditional cheesemaking. Nut milk (usually from cashews) is blended, then inoculated with bacterial cultures and sometimes moulds (like Penicillium candidum for Brie-style rinds, or Penicillium roqueforti for blue-style cheeses). The cheese is then formed, salted, and aged - sometimes for several weeks, allowing complex flavours and textures to develop naturally. This is why artisan vegan cheeses taste significantly better than their supermarket counterparts, and also why they cost more.

Types of Vegan Cheese

The range of vegan cheese available in the UK has expanded dramatically. You can now find:

• Slices and blocks. The supermarket staples - cheddar-style, mozzarella-style, and smoked alternatives. These are coconut oil or starch-based and designed for sandwiches, toasties, and cooking.
• Grated and shredded. Pre-grated pizza cheese and cooking cheese, typically designed to melt. Widely available from most major supermarkets.
• Cream cheese and spreads. Soft, spreadable alternatives. Used on bagels, in baking, and as dip bases.
• Artisan soft cheeses. Camembert, Brie, and goat's cheese style alternatives. Made from cashews and cultured with traditional cheese moulds.
• Blue cheese. Cultured with Penicillium roqueforti, these have genuine blue veining and a tangy, complex flavour. 
• Feta-style. Crumbly, briny alternatives made from cashews or soy, designed for salads and Mediterranean cooking.
• Parmesan-style. Hard, grateable alternatives for pasta dishes. These vary widely in quality.

Vegan Cheese vs Dairy Cheese: How Do They Compare?

Nutritional Comparison

This is where the two diverge most significantly. Traditional dairy cheese is naturally rich in protein (7–10g per 30g serving for hard cheeses), calcium (150–330mg per 30g), and B vitamins. It's also high in saturated fat and can be high in salt.

Most coconut oil-based vegan cheeses are significantly lower in protein (often less than 1g per 30g) and, unless fortified, contain little or no calcium. They tend to be lower in saturated fat than dairy cheese, though coconut oil is itself a saturated fat. They contain no cholesterol.

Nut-based artisan vegan cheeses fare better on protein (cashews provide some) but are still lower than dairy cheese. For a detailed look at the nutritional profile of dairy cheese, see our guide to whether cheese is good for you.

The nutritional differences are substantial. If you're choosing vegan cheese for health reasons, it's worth being realistic about what you're gaining and what you're giving up. The absence of cholesterol is a genuine advantage, but the near-absence of protein and calcium in many products is a meaningful trade-off.

Taste and Texture

This is subjective and has changed dramatically in recent years. Five years ago, most vegan cheeses were a poor imitation. Today, the best artisan products particularly cultured nut-based Camemberts and blues are genuinely impressive. 

That said, there's still a noticeable gap between vegan cheese and traditional dairy cheese, especially in the hard cheese category. Replicating the complex, crystalline depth of an aged cheddar or the sharp bite of a mature Parmesan remains a significant challenge for plant-based producers. Soft cheeses and cream cheese-style products have come much closer to their dairy equivalents.

Melting

Early vegan cheeses were notorious for refusing to melt. Modern products have improved significantly. Coconut oil-based cheeses generally melt reasonably well, they soften, spread and can be used on pizza, in toasties, and for grilled cheese. Nut-based cheeses melt less reliably because their solid base doesn't behave the same way as dairy fat when heated.

The stretchiness and "pull" of melted dairy cheese (created by the casein protein network in milk) is the hardest property to replicate. Some products use tapioca starch to create a similar stretch, with reasonable success. Precision fermentation companies are working on using lab-grown casein to solve this challenge entirely, though these products are not yet widely available in the UK.

Is Vegan Cheese Healthy?

The answer depends on the product and what you're comparing it to.

Vegan cheese is cholesterol-free and generally lower in saturated fat than dairy cheese, which may be beneficial for heart health. It's also suitable for people with lactose intolerance and dairy allergies.

However, many mass-market vegan cheeses are nutritionally sparse. They're low in protein, may lack calcium and B vitamins unless fortified, and can contain a long list of processed ingredients (starches, gums, emulsifiers, flavourings). They're not nutritionally equivalent to dairy cheese and shouldn't be treated as a like-for-like swap without considering the differences.

Nut-based artisan cheeses tend to have a better nutritional profile (more protein, healthy fats, fewer additives) but are more expensive and less widely available.

The healthiest approach is to check labels, choose products with shorter ingredient lists where possible, and make sure you're getting calcium and B12 from other sources in your diet if you're relying on vegan cheese as a dairy replacement.

Is Vegan Cheese Processed?

Most commercial vegan cheese is a processed food, yes. The degree of processing varies:

Supermarket vegan cheeses typically involve blending refined coconut oil with starches, water, emulsifiers, and flavourings. These are ultra-processed by most definitions.

Artisan vegan cheeses use fewer ingredients and rely on fermentation and ageing rather than industrial processing. These are closer to minimally processed foods, though they're still "made" rather than "grown."

For context, traditional dairy cheese is also a processed food - it's made by adding cultures and rennet to milk, separating curds from whey, and pressing and ageing the result. The difference is that dairy cheesemaking has been refined over millennia and typically involves fewer and more recognisable ingredients than mass-market vegan cheese.

We sell traditional dairy cheese, not vegan alternatives. If you're a cheese lover who values flavour, simplicity, and provenance, our cheese wedges and waxed cheese truckles are made from quality milk with a short list of natural ingredients - milk, salt, cultures, and rennet. Nothing more complicated than that.