The best cheese references pop culture has to offer

Mashable bites into a creamy, nutty, gooey, and sometimes stinky world during our first-ever Cheese Week.

Who among us doesn't crave a nice, cheesy movie or TV moment every so often?

Grand romantic gestures and impassioned speeches are enjoyable to watch, but for the purposes of this article, when we say "cheesy scenes," we're quite literally talking about scenes that highlight one of the greatest foods on the planet: Cheese.

Classic entertainment like Tom and Jerry and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles celebrated cheese (or cheese pizza) on the regular, but other television shows and movies have mastered the art of subtle, hilarious, and truly creative odes to cheese.

SEE ALSO: YouTuber recreated Apple's Mac Pro case to see if it could grate cheese

Here are 18 of the absolute best cheese references made in pop culture over the past few decades. Enjoy, cheese-lovers!

1. She's the Man

The 2006 romantic comedy, She's the Man — inspired by William Shakespeare's play, Twelfth Night — highlighted just how vital cheese is in our lives. I mean, the mere mention of it in casual conversation can bring people together.

A memorable scene in which Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum's characters discuss how to successfully flirt spirals into a delightfully charming cheese convo, which eventually gets interrupted by a tarantula. The cheesy pick-up line is used again later in the movie, though, and the film's ending gives a romantic shoutout to Gouda.

2. 30 Rock

Tina Fey really knows how to appreciate cheese.

30 Rock kicked off Season 4 with Jack Donaghy taking Liz, Tracey, and Jenna to a restaurant called "Season 4" for some "Cheesy Blasters." If you're unfamiliar with the culinary concoction, it's a hot dog, stuffed with jack cheese, folded in a pizza. Allow Liz to explain.

30 Rock is also known for airing one of the most expensive cheese scenes in TV history. In Episode 19 of Season 3, Liz gets all cozy in her Snuggie to work on her "night cheese" and makes up a song inspired by Bob Seger's "Night Moves."

Even though it only lasted "like a second," the catchy cheese tune wound up costing the network "like, $50,000," according to Jeff Richmond, Tina Fey's husband and a former 30 Rock executive producer/composer.

3. Schitt's Creek

Upon realizing that no one in the Rose family really knows how to cook, Moira sets out to pass her former cook's enchilada recipe down to David. Things in the kitchen go fine-adjacent, until the recipe calls for David to "fold in the cheese." Like, what in Schitt's Creek does that mean?

The Season 2 episode, called "Family Dinner," almost certainly features the words "fold in the cheese" more times than any other onscreen endeavor in history ever has or will. Truly stunning work.

4. The Office

The Office is known for its supremely hilarious cold opens, and one of the best just so happens to include cheese. In "Heavy Competition" — Episode 24 of the show's fifth season — Michael, Pam, and Ryan are goofing around with cheese balls at the new Michael Scott Paper Company office.  

The cold open shows the three former Dunder Mifflin employees mastering all sorts of cheese ball-eating tricks, and eventually Ryan stuffs a record 32 cheese balls into his mouth. 

The show also features an absolutely pathetic makeshift cheese cart in Season 6, which Andy Bernard assembles and then uses to sneak Michael into a meeting between Jim and David Wallace.

5. The Simpsons

American cheese definitely has its haters, and while some may be abandoning it in favor of fancier cheeses, it will always have the love of Homer Simpson.

In Season 5, Episode 4 of The Simpsons, titled "Rosebud," Homer is seen walking down to the kitchen at night. He sits, places a stack of 64 individually wrapped slices of American cheese in front of him, and proceeds to eat every single one as the sun rises. Iconic.

6. That's So Raven

There is perhaps no greater embodiment of Raven's memorable catchphrase — "Ya nasty!" — than Season 2, Episode 6 of That's So Raven. 

Titled "Clothes Minded," the episode has Principal Lawler introducing school uniforms, much to Raven's dismay. Tensions are high, and Raven attempts to prank the school by stashing a wheel of Parmesan in an air vent, but before the heat makes it stink up the building, she has second thoughts.

When Raven tries to retrieve the cheese, it rolls further into the vent, and she heroically crawls in after it. As the heat rises, Raven ties her hair back and proceeds to locate the bubbling, melting, rancid wheel. As she approaches it, the vent narrows and her arms get stuck by her sides. At that point, the only way to stop the cheese scent from spreading through the school is to dig into the wheel face first, pie-eating contest style. The sight of Raven eating the vent cheese will haunt you for the rest of time.

7. A Goofy Movie

The 1995 animated film A Goofy Movie honors yet another controversial cheese: canned. Goofy's son, Max Goof, is pals with Bobby Zimuruski, a dude who lives for canned Cheez Whiz. He accepts it as payment for certain favors and often has a can on-hand for any cheese-related cravings. He's also quite the cheese sculptor.

8. Parks and Rec

Parks and Rec is packed with cheese references. There are subtle ones, like the time Ron said he would rather work for Chuck E. Cheese, impassioned conversations about nachos and mac and cheese pizza, and, of course, that one time Ben brought cheese into the country illegally. 

9. Dexter's Laboratory

What would this list be without a nod to "The Big Cheese" — that episode of Dexter's Lab in which Dexter attempts to learn how to speak French in his sleep? As a result of a skipping French tape, Dexter finds himself unable to say anything besides "omelette du fromage," which translates to "cheese omelette."

10. Full House 

In a Full House episode that I'm sure only the most dedicated cheese lovers of the '90s will recall, Stephanie reveals her specialty snack: cheese doughnuts. To make the "doughnuts," she literally just bites a hole in Kraft Singles, but later on in the series she ups her cheese game by making a meatloaf with cheese frosting for her dog Comet's  birthday.

11. Seinfeld

Remember in Season 8, Episode 1 of Seinfeld when George utters the one-of-a-kind line, "I was stripped to the waist, eating a block of cheese the size of a car battery." He'd mourned the death of his former fiancée Susan for three months, and was finally ready to embrace the bachelor life. To him, the ideal night of freedom consisted of uninhibited cheese eating. Relatable.

12. New Girl

Season 1, Episode 14 of New Girl finds Cece reluctant to admit that she shares chemistry with Schmidt. But after Schmidt delivers *the* sexiest cheese speech of perhaps all time, she has no choice but to reconsider, if only for a moment.

13. A Grand Day Out

Remember when Wallace and Gromit ran out of cheese in the 1989 animated film A Grand Day Out? They built a rocket and set out on a delicious, out-of-this-world adventure to the freaking moon (since it's made of cheese) to satisfy their cravings. Such passion.

14. Hannah Montana

To this day, one of the catchiest TV cheese jingles remains the "Cheese Jerky" song from Hannah Montana. I mean, what's not to love about cheese and jerky?

15. Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Things get extra weird for the Scooby Gang in Buffy the Vampire Slayer when the "Cheese Man" appears in Buffy, Rupert, Xander, and Willow's dreams. He's a terrifyingly odd bald man with glasses who somehow makes cheese slices scary. NBD.

16. Pulp Fiction

It's not the most iconic cheese scene in my eyes, but this list would be incomplete without honoring the classic Pulp Fiction "quarter pounder with cheese" scene between Vincent Vega (John Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson).

17. Mouse Hunt

The ending of Mouse Hunt shows a mouth-watering cheese factory filled with all sorts of dairy delicacies, including the innovative giant balls of String Cheese that a literal mouse is asked to taste and approve. It's quite a touching scene.

18. Ratatouille

We have to end with a nod to all of the thoughtful cheese scenes in Ratatouille. Shoutout to Remy for reminding us that cheese is meant to be savored and enjoyed, not just "horked down."

Be sure to grab some cheese to chow down on the next time you watch one of the delightful picks from the list above.

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