Every cracker has its thing. Triscuits pack a very textured shredded wheat punch. Carr’s are wafer thin and, honestly, a slightly awkward size for most slices of cheese. Ritz Crackers are a crumbly staple—affordable, packaged in giant batches, and versatile. But, allegedly, Ritz Crackers have another purpose: they cut the cheese. Well, literally. As far as we know, cutting the cheese in idiom fashion is just not within a Ritz Cracker’s realm of possibilities. According to the official Ritz TikTok, there’s a reason for the crackers lovely scalloped ridges. And, surprisingly, it is not for aesthetic purposes.
@theritzcrackersofficial 💫 the more you know 💫 #RITZCrackers #snackhacks #snacks #cheese #fyp #foryoupage
♬ I'M FEELING LUCKY - Ellen Once Again
Now, I like Ritz Crackers enough. They’re a pantry staple, perfectly paired with a slice of cheese, a bowl of soup, or a dip. But never in my wildest dreams can I imagine a scenario where they could take on the role of cutting the cheese. In place of a knife, no less. Maybe I just hold Ritz Crackers too aggressively, like a tiny Hulk. But I suspect not.
You see, I have a few qualms with the TikTok’s claims, which we first saw at DesignTAXI. For starters, the TikTok demonstrates the cheese-slicing method on a piece of Swiss cheese that’s already sliced pretty thin. If you’re so confident in the cracker’s cheese-slicing abilities, why buy deli cheese and not, say, the superior cheddar? (My beef is not with Swiss, which is a perfectly fine cheese to slap on a sandwich.) Obviously, it’s not easy to cut into a block of cheddar. For a Ritz Cracker, specifically, I wouldn’t trust myself to cut into a block of goat cheese. It’s just a crumbly cracker in general.
Then, of course, there’s the fact that the crackers, at the most, made a tiny impression. A light dotted line to aid the snacker in making an even tear. The hand at the center of the TikTok clearly put some effort into making the impression on the already-thin cheese and then had to tear the cheese into multiple pieces. Give me a knife, cutting board, a selection of hard and soft cheeses, some fig spread, grapes, and a little cured meat. May as well make it a day if we’re going through all this effort for cheese and crackers anyway.
But, alas it is a clever marketing ploy regardless of the real rationale behind Ritz Crackers’ scalloped ridges. I have spent so much of my morning thinking about crackers and I am also hungry. Ritz Crackers, I toast to you a beautiful block of Kerrygold cheddar.
