Bread Cheese substitute

Best substitute

Halloumi

Use the same amount by weight, soaked 20 to 30 minutes in cold water as the bread cheese you are replacing

Best for pan-frying

Different taste

The best substitute for bread cheese is halloumi, measure for measure, soaked in cold water for twenty minutes first to pull out some of its salt. Paneer is the closest on flavour because it is unsalted and milky, and queso para freir is the cheapest widely available frying cheese.

Other bread cheese substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Paneer
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight
Unsalted, mild and milky, which makes it the closest thing to bread cheese in flavour rather than in behaviour.
What changes
Best for
pan-frying, grilling, kaffeost, with jam, skewers
Tastes right and needs no soaking, but it is crumblier and less springy, it does not squeak, and it browns reluctantly. Get the pan genuinely hot and use a little butter to force some colour onto the surface.
3Queso para Freir or Queso Blanco
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
A purpose-built frying cheese: firm, mildly salty, browns readily and holds its shape completely.
What changes
Best for
pan-frying, grilling, breakfast, salads
Widely stocked, cheap, and it does the job without fuss. Slightly rubberier and saltier than bread cheese, so rinse it if you are serving it in coffee, and expect a firmer chew than the real thing.
4Fresh Cheese Curds
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight, but only as a cold or barely warmed snack
The same mild flavour and the same famous squeak, which is what most people are actually chasing.
What changes
Best for
snacking, cheese boards, salads
Right squeak, right mildness, wrong behaviour under heat. Curds are loose nuggets that melt and slump in a pan, so they cannot stand in for a grilled or baked slab of bread cheese. Perfect if the squeak alone is the point.
5Kefalotyri or Greek Frying Cheese
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by weight
The saganaki cheese: aged, firm and salty, and it fries to a genuinely crisp golden crust.
What changes
Best for
pan-frying, saganaki, salads, appetisers
Fries beautifully and browns better than anything else on this list, but it softens more in the middle and the flavour is far sharper and saltier than bread cheese's near-neutral milkiness. Wrong for kaffeost, excellent as a fried appetiser.
6Extra-Firm Tofu, Pressed
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by weight
The dairy-free option, which sears hard, holds its shape completely and takes the same treatment with jam or in hot coffee.
What changes
Best for
pan-frying, grilling, vegan versions
Structurally it works surprisingly well, and it browns nicely if pressed and dried first. It has none of the dairy richness and no squeak whatsoever, so salt it properly and brown it hard or it tastes of nothing.

What is Bread Cheese?

Bread Cheese is Bread cheese, known in Finland as juustoleipa or leipajuusto, is a mild fresh cheese baked or broiled until the surface chars in patches, which stays firm and squeaks against your teeth instead of melting when heated.

Cooking tips

Bread cheese is meant to be warmed rather than melted. Three or four minutes a side in a dry hot pan, or a few minutes under the broiler until the surface blisters and spots brown, is all it needs.
The Finnish way is kaffeost: drop warm cubes into a cup of black coffee and eat them with a spoon once they have softened and absorbed some of it. Any non-melting cheese works, but pick a mild one, because halloumi's salt fights the coffee unless you soak it first.
Salt is the one thing you must adjust when substituting. Bread cheese is barely salted while halloumi, queso para freir and kefalotyri are all salted firmly, so soak or rinse them and taste before seasoning anything else on the plate.
Do not add oil to the pan for these cheeses. They release enough of their own fat, and a dry non-stick or cast-iron pan gives much better browning than an oiled one, which tends to steam the surface instead.
It reheats well, so slice and warm only what you need. Cold bread cheese is dull and faintly rubbery, and the whole appeal is the contrast between a hot blistered surface and a mild, squeaky interior.
It is sold under several names, including juustoleipa, leipajuusto, juusto and simply Finnish squeaky cheese, and American-made versions from Wisconsin dairies are now common in US supermarket cheese cases.

Frequently asked questions

Does bread cheese melt?

No, and that is the point of it. The curd is made and heated in a way that sets the proteins so they no longer flow, which is the same principle behind halloumi and paneer. Under a broiler it browns and blisters on the surface while staying firm and sliceable inside, so it never runs off the plate.

Is halloumi a good substitute for bread cheese?

It is the best one, measure for measure, because it grills and fries without melting in exactly the same way. The only real problem is salt: halloumi is brined and bread cheese is not. Soak it in cold water for twenty to thirty minutes, changing the water once, and it comes remarkably close.

Can I just leave the bread cheese out?

Not usually, because in nearly every recipe that calls for it, it is the dish rather than an ingredient in the dish. Grilled bread cheese with cloudberry jam, or kaffeost, has nothing left once you remove the cheese. Halloumi or paneer will give you the same dish with a small shift in salt and squeak.

Is bread cheese the same as cheese curds?

No, though they share the famous squeak. Cheese curds are loose fresh nuggets of curd that melt when heated, which is why they work in poutine. Bread cheese is those curds pressed into a disc and then baked, which sets it so it holds its shape and browns instead of melting.

What does bread cheese taste like?

Very mild and milky, faintly sweet, with only a little salt, plus a toasty, slightly caramelised flavour from the charred surface. It is a texture cheese rather than a flavour cheese, which is why the substitution question has a technical answer about melting behaviour rather than a flavour one.

Related substitutes

More cheese substitutes

Bread Cheese substitute

Other bread cheese substitutes

2Paneer

3Queso para Freir or Queso Blanco

4Fresh Cheese Curds

5Kefalotyri or Greek Frying Cheese

6Extra-Firm Tofu, Pressed