Digiorno shredded parmesan cheese, bought by my wife because it is a ton cheaper than the stuff shredded or grated in the store from actual blocks.
Ingredients: Parmesan Cheese, Dried Cellulose, and some preservative or other.
The cheese itself: Tastes like plastic. Does not melt when cooked in something but instead shrivels up into toenails.
Is the “parmesan cheese” listed in the ingredients not really parmesan cheese? Does “dried cellulose” do something terrible to shredded cheese? Is it the preservative? What?
How different can cheeses be and still be dubbed “parmesan”?
Pretty different. It’s probably crap-ass American “parmesan” cheese, which I’ve always found to taste pretty much like shards of plastic, just like you. There are better American “parmesans” to be found in wedge form in the deli, but the betterness is only a question of degree.
Go to Costco and buy yourself a wedge of imported Parmigiano Reggiano, grate it yourself (or shave it over your caesar salad), and you’ll never look back. Yep, it’s kind of expensive, but a little goes a long way.
In Austin, most of the normal retail groceries we went to carried an Argentine parmesan in wedges at about $6/lb. It wasn’t quite as as delicious as the $12+ Italian stuff, but miles better than the American ones we tried.