Cream cheese overview

Interested in learning more about what makes cream cheese so good? Become a cream cheese category guru and learn more about our products to unlock the power of dairy on your menu.

Cream cheese is a soft, spreadable cheese made from milk and cream. Unlike aged cheeses, it isn’t matured and is meant to be consumed fresh. Due to its creamy texture and mild taste with a rich nutty, and slightly sweet flavor, cream cheese lends itself well to a variety of applications in foodservice and retail. Its versatility makes it a popular ingredient in foodservice as it can be used in both sweet and savory dishes. Some of its most popular applications include cheesecakes, frostings, fillings, dips, and sushi. Its spreadable texture also makes it ideal for bagels, crackers, or even burgers, sandwiches, and wraps. Of course, it’s a popular household staple in retail as well. It’s available in plain and flavored varieties, meeting a wide array of consumer preferences. We offer national brand equivalent aligned formulas, custom formulations, and innovative flavors in a variety of cream cheese types.

Benefits and capabilities

  • Functionality
    • Cream cheese is an adaptable ingredient that comes in many varieties. Its clean formula uses minimal ingredients and contains no preservatives or added colors, making it ideal for baking, sauces, spreads, fillings, and appetizers.
    • Neufchatel is a type of cream cheese that contains 1/3 less fat and fewer calories than traditional cream cheese. It has a softer texture that is perfect for dips and spreads. 
    • Soft cream cheese is another variety that has excellent spreadability. It is often combined with other ingredients to create signature spreads for sandwiches, bagels, crackers, or dips.
    • Whipped cream cheese spread has a very spreadable texture and releases its flavor rapidly when eaten.
    • Cream cheese substitute fully replaces butterfat with palm oil and is a popular alternative to cream cheese. It is often used in crab rangoon, sauces, dips, soups, sushi, and cheesecakes. 
  • Formats
    • Cream cheese comes in a variety of formats to suit different uses. The most common retail format is the cream cheese bar (sometimes called brick), an 8oz block of firm yet spreadable cheese perfect for all cream cheese recipes including baking. The cup format is perfect for consumers who keep it in their fridges. For foodservice and industrial formats, Schreiber offers cream cheese in 3- to 5-pound tubs, individual portion cups, and 3-pound loaves along with industrial bulk and barrel formats. Schreiber Foods offers many size options to meet all operators’ back-of-house needs.

Performance and applications

  • Performance attributes
    • Loaf
      • Schreiber loaf bulk cream cheese products provide versatility, consistency, and quality that manufacturers and foodservice operations can count on. Our cream cheese can be used for a wide variety of foodservice applications including hot and cold.
    • Tub
      • Schreiber tub cream cheese applications are nearly endless: Feature it atop trendy toasts and tartines, substitute it for butter in mashed potatoes, showcase it in dips or as a spread on crackers, use it to create traditional cheesecakes and cream cheese frosting, and so much more.
    • Portion
      • Using this perfectly portioned, light, and creamy plain cream cheese spread, you can easily serve fresh bagels with their signature topping maximizing convenience for guests of your hotel or convenience store. Provide these cream cheese cups in your to-go bags with fresh-baked bagels at your bakery or offer them as part of your hotel’s breakfast bar so your patrons can take as much cream cheese as they need.
    • Cup
      • Schreiber’s cream cheese cups are available in a variety of flavors and cup sizes to meet the diverse needs of operators. Whether it’s shmearing it on a bagel, creating a more premium appetizer, or upping the cheesiness of comfort food favorites like grilled cheese and burgers.
    • Bulk
      • Bulk cream cheese is an essential ingredient for manufacturing operations that produce back-of-house applications. It works wonderfully in anything from cheesecakes and pastries to appetizers and soups.
    • Bar
      • Cream cheese bars are an excellent ingredient and widely used for baking and cooking recipes that call for cream cheese. Some consumers also prefer cream cheese bars over cream cheese spread cups for spreading applications.