This Guide gleans the key requirements, suggestions, and best practices from the vast sea of information available to cheesemakers, and condenses them into a more easily digestible format written in more accessible language. We hope you will find that the information provided in this Guide is useful and answers some of your key questions.

The second edition of the Guide, published in February 2017, includes updates based on changing regulations, incorporates direct feedback and clarification from reviewers at the U.S. Food & Drug Administration, and provides more current resources and templates where available. The ACS Regulatory & Academic Committee reviews and updates the Guide regularly, publishing updates as needed to keep up with changing regulations and scientific advances.

The latest addition to the Guide, an Addendum to Chapter 6 on the use of vegetable ash, was released in September 2018.