Riverbank maker of unusual cheese snacks is among 3 in region with dairy innovation grants

A Riverbank business is finding its way in the crowded cheese sector with intriguing flavors on a mozzarella-like product.

Cheese Bits come in 3.5-ounce snack packs with options that include smoked, strawberry and wasabi (a Japanese horseradish). Calabrian chili and habanero/mango versions are coming, founder and CEO Stefen Choy said during a May 31 tour.

This is clearly not your kid’s string cheese, a much more common item from the San Joaquin Valley’s huge dairy industry.

“(Consumers) want good-tasting products that are convenient, that are good for you,” Choy said. “But they don’t want the old things over and over.”

Cheese Bits just got a $500,000 federal grant to help it expand. It now employs five full-time and 10 part-time people. The goal is to have everyone full-time at some point, Choy said.

Smaller grants went to two other dairy producers in the region. Hilmar Cheese Co. got $40,000 to update its visitor center. Another $40,450 will help add drinkable yogurt at Stuyt Dairy Farmstead Cheese Co., near Escalon.

Mexican cheese maker came earlier

Cheese Bits has operated since 2021 in a small building on Santa Fe Street in downtown Riverbank. It was the original home in 1996 of Rizo Lopez Foods, a Mexican cheese producer that moved in 2012 to a much larger Modesto plant.

The newer company’s master cheese maker is Moises Berber, who used to work for Rizo Lopez. He puts local milk into weekly batches of mozzamini, a hybrid of mozzarella and provolone. It does not need aging.

Some of the cheese is formed into sticks, about 20 per pack and designed for stretching. Some goes into grape-sized “tots,” sold by the dozen. The rest become “pearls,” which are even littler.

The plain and smoked options come in all three shapes. Wasabi and strawberry are only in pearls. The fruit flavor is a seasonal offering over the winter holidays.

Wasabi and strawberry farmers supply these tastes. An onsite smoker, fed with hickory wood, imparts the other flavor.

“We adhere to the old way of smoking, instead of using the liquid smoke that other companies use,” Choy said.

Raley’s and O’Brien’s are among retailers

Cheese Bits are sold in about 2,000 stores around the nation. Stanislaus County residents can find them at several Raley’s sites, both O’Brien’s Market locations in Modesto, and at Nob Hill in Newman. They sold for $4.99 on a recent visit to O’Brien’s.

The grant came from the U.S. Department of Agriculture through the Pacific Coast Coalition Dairy Business Innovation Initiative. It awarded a total of $5.87 million across six states in May.

Cheese Bits plans to use its $500,000 to expand its cold-storage capacity, to automate its packaging, and for other needs.

Milk is the top farm product in Stanislaus County. It brought about $1.13 billion in gross income to farmers in 2022, the most recent report from the agricultural commissioner said.

But dairy farmers often have tight profit margins, due in part to a decline in fluid milk consumption (cartons and jugs). Cheese, ice cream, yogurt and other value-added products have done better.

More on Hilmar Cheese and Stuyt Dairy

Hilmar Cheese was launched by several dairy farmers in 1984 and now has the world’s largest plant on Lander Avenue.

The visitor center has a cafe, retail food sales and exhibits on the cheese industry. The USDA grant will freshen up the displays with an emphasis on dairy careers and nutritional value.

Hilmar makes a variety of cheese types for labeling by other companies. It added a Texas plant in 2007 and is completing another in Kansas.

Stuyt makes Dutch and an a few other cheese types on Mariposa Road, about four miles northwest of Escalon. The founders, Rick and Ansally Stuyt, immigrated from the Netherlands and began making cheese in 2015.

This is “farmstead” cheese, meaning the milk comes from the owners’ cows. The land has been in the family since 1965.

The USDA grant will pay for machinery to fill and cap packages of drinkable yogurt. It is a Dutch favorite that also contains pudding.