American cheese often does contain actual cheddar. It's basically a cheese blend that is mixed together with sodium citrate. I live in Germany and American cheese cannot be sold as "cheese" here, the industry usually calls it "Sandwichscheiben", but maybe Switzerland is less strict.

[–] federalreverse@feddit.de 3 points 6 months ago

Actually, part of the reason that American cheese cannot be called "cheese" even in the US is that it's not just cheese + sodium citrate anymore. For cost reasons, it's now cheese + butter + skim milk powder + sodium citrate.