Don't have a meltdown, but Kraft has announced that it is running low on Velveeta.

Mysteriously, the company has not given a reason for the apparent shortage of the velvety cheese-like product. Are they hoping for a Sriracha-like run on the runny yellow “food” stuff? The twits are already calling it #Cheesepocalypse, and panicked websites are running recipes on how-to make queso dip without Velveeta. 

]A spokeswoman for Kraft merely says such shortages “happen” “from time to time,” and that the lack of availability is more noticeable because of “seasonable demand” (Super Bowl nacho season). On the plus side – depending on how you look at it – she says the Velveeta shortage should be “short term,” according to USA Today. 

It appears the “shortage” is mostly happening on the East Coast, where all the cheese is frozen anyway and makes great bricks for building igloos. (We kid.)

Velveeta, a nearly 100-year-old Frankencheeese, is labeled in the United States as a “Pasteurized Recipe Cheese Product” and was originally marketed to housewives as a health food. In a rather complicated chemical process, salts, whey, curds and milk fat are combined and heated in vats to get certain magical effects, then molded into blocks with long shelf lives. According to Discover magazine, Americans now eat more cheese food than natural cheese.

We really can't get ourselves too worked up about this Velveeta scare. Let them eat Kraft Singles. 

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