Some cheeses like Babybell are small and cute, while others like Edam are football sized. But there is a small selection of cheeses that are even bigger than edam. In fact, they are several times bigger than your average edam and they are considered the biggest cheeses in the world…
1,100 lb Cheese
10 – 499 kg/1,100 lb
This 2.7 meter/9 ft circumference Cheddar named the “Great Pennard Cheese” after the Somerset village in which it was made, was presented to Queen Victoria as a wedding gift in 1840. It was immediately taken to London and exhibited at the Egyptian Hall in Piccadilly, but on its return to the Queen it was found to have suffered in the heat of the lights in the exhibition and was totally inedible.
1,100 lb Cheese
9 – 543 kg/1,100 lb
This giant cheese was made on the 3rd of March way back in 1989 in the village of West Pennard, Somerset, by John Green. It was built to recreate the “Great Pennard Cheese” and was an exhibit at May 1989 Festival of British Food and Farming. It took 5,455 liters/1,200 gallons of milk and measured 75 cm/3 ft in diameter and 2.7 m/9 ft in circumference.
1,200 lb Cheese
8 – 544 kg/1,200 lb
This huge Cheshire cheese was given in 1801 to President Thomas Jefferson by a preacher called John Leland. Appropriately it was made by the town of Cheshire, Massachusetts.
1,400 lb Cheese
7 – 653 kg/1,400 lb
This super-sized Cheddar was given to President Andre Jackson. After maturing for two years in the White House, it was then given to the people of Washington, DC on Washington’s Birthday as a party treat.
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1,474 lb Cheese
6 – 669 kg/1,474 lb
This gigantic cheese measured 3.90 m/13 ft in circumference and it was made by James Elgar of Peterborough, Northamptonshire way back in 1849.
8,000 lb Cheese
5 – 3,629 kg/8,000 lb
This large Canadian Cheddar was made especially for the 1883 Toronto Fair. Making one for a local fair seems to be a constant trend.
11,815 lb Cheese
4 – 5,359 kg/11,815 lb
This big Cheddar cheese was made in January 1957 in Flint, Michigan. It was made from the milk pooled by a group of 367 farmers who hand milked their 6,600 cows for it!
14,440 lb Cheese
3 – 6,096 kg/14,440 lb
Using the milk from well over 6,000 cows comes a giant cheese that started production on the 12th of July 1937. It too was exhibited at the New York State Fair in Syracuse.
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34,591 lb Cheese
2 – 15,690 kg/34,591 lb
Made from the 20th to the 22nd of January 1964 for the Worlds Fair, New York, by the Wisconsin Cheese Foundation was a cheese that measured 4.35m/14.5 ft long, 1.95m/6.5 ft wide and 1.80 m/6 ft high! It also took 183 tonnes of milk to make which is the equivalent to a day’s output by a heard of over 16,000 cows. It was toured and displayed until 1968 when it was cut into small pieces and sold. As late as 1978, the last two chunks were sold at a charity auction for £250 each.
40,060 lb Cheese
1 – 18,171 kg/40,060 lb
Making gigantic cheeses is not a modern eccentricity: in his National History, the Roman historian Pliny describes a 454 kg/1,000 lb cheese that was made in the Tuscan town of Luni. The current world record holder is this monster Cheddar manufactured on 13-14 March 1988 by Simon’s Speciality Cheese of Little Chute, Wisconsin, USA. It was then taken on tour in a refrigerated “cheesemobile”.