Even better, it says "The label doesn't just say parmesan, it says 100% parmesan. That's because we only use the finest ingredients, carefully crafted and aged for a sharp, distinctive taste that enhances your favourite dishes - a taste that's 100% real, 100% parmesan."
They can get away with it because "parmesan" doesn't actually mean anything outside of the EU.
Edit: As that other poster just pointed out, maybe it does mean something in the US (that label was from Canada), since someone's actually facing criminal charges for it.
>Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania-based Castle produced mainly imitation cheeses for nearly 30 years. The company, whose factory was adorned with crenelated battlements and curved archways to look like a medieval castle, had $19 million in sales in 2013.
>According to the FDA’s report on Castle, obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, “no parmesan cheese was used to manufacture” the Market Pantry brand 100% grated Parmesan Cheese, sold at Target Corp. stores, and Always Save Grated Parmesan Cheese and Best Choice 100% Grated Parmesan Cheese, sold by Associated Wholesale Grocers Inc., which along with its subsidiaries supplies 3,400 retail stores in 30 states. Instead, there was a mixture of Swiss, mozzarella, white cheddar and cellulose, according to the FDA.
>Castle President Michelle Myrter is scheduled to plead guilty this month to criminal charges. She faces up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine.
Though I find it ironic that they responded honestly to the FOI request.
The FOIA request was a request to the FDA from Bloomberg for the FDA's investigation on Castle. It was used by Bloomberg to write the article. The Freedom of Information Act is only to request information from a government agency. To uncover the fraud the FDA physically visited Castle. They were tipped off by a disgruntled former employee. Without the tip off there is a extremely small chance they would have ever been caught.
The FDA can only respond with the information they have, so as it took the FDA actually visiting Castle (on a tip-off no less), they must have been lied to as well.
Surely, a FOI request can't realistically trigger someone jumping in a car to verify data held on file.
To a reasonable approximation, the only shredded Parmesan you can buy that is likely to contain anything like Parmesan is the stuff that's shredded on-site by places that also sell wheels/chunks of Parmesan.
OTOH, there's rarely a good reason to buy shredded parmesan even if its real; for most uses you want shredded parmesan, the size/shape of shreds you get from such a product aren't great, and its better (and, in any case, cheaper in the long run) to just get blocks of parmesan and a grater, and in typical use quantities you aren't saving much time or effort by getting pre-grated.