Pimento cheese
by Ruth's
Open Food Facts label for barcode 0074952120147 · Ruth's · Fats. Screening numbers and flags live in the verdict band below. This hero only situates the source record.
The verdict
Pimento cheese by Ruth's scores 50/100 in PlainFoodSafe's ingredient screening. We compared its 45 labeled ingredients with FDA SAFFA regulatory records and CSPI Chemical Cuisine ratings; 2 ingredients are flagged for caution. The source parser split this into a very long 45-component record, beginning with Imitation Salad Cheese, Water, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil. That density can include amounts and label fragments, so verify the physical label before relying on ingredient order or completeness. This is not a recall, allergy, medical, or dietary-safety determination.
- 50/100
- Concern safety score
- 2
- Few flagged · of 45 analyzed
- Group 4
- Ultra-processed
- D
- Nutri-Score nutrition grade
Computed directly from OpenFoodFacts ingredient data cross-referenced with FDA SAFFA and CSPI Chemical Cuisine ratings. See our methodology for the scoring formula.
Composite profile score
One verdict from three independent sources
38/100
Grade F
Ingredient Safety
50/100
FDA/CSPI flagged-ingredient screening
Processing Level
NOVA 4
Ultra-processed foods
Nutrition Grade
D
Nutri-Score front-of-pack nutrition grade
Weighted 50% ingredient safety / 25% processing level / 25% nutrition grade. A dimension with no data for this product (common: source coverage is partial) is dropped and its weight redistributes across the remaining dimensions, so missing data never silently lowers the score. See the full benchmark table.
52120147 · Open Food Facts · July 2026
Pimento cheese label screening desk
13 of 45 parsed ingredients carry FDA SAFFA or CSPI coverage (lead: Yellow 6). Source sheet 52120147 · Open Food Facts · July 2026. The screening score and flag counts are in the verdict band above. This desk is the provenance stamp, not a second scorecard. Methodology · Read with nearest score peer: Green Wafers · Nearest score peer is Green Wafers at the same screening score.
Screening model notes
How Nutri-Score, NOVA, and list length read this record
This label lands in the third of four positions on the published scale. What separates that position from its neighbours is arithmetic rather than judgement: identical inputs run through the documented weighting always arrive at the same place. Anyone who works the calculation through by hand, using the methodology write-up together with the itemised ratings further down, will reproduce this number exactly — which is the reason for publishing a computed figure instead of an opinion.
This label falls in the fourth Nutri-Score band. The model arrives there when its penalty terms — energy density, sugars, saturated fat, sodium — carry more weight in the calculation than the fibre, protein and produce content it credits. The band covers a wide span of the points scale, so position within it is not visible from the letter alone. The grade reflects the declared nutrition panel and is unrelated to the additive ratings listed below, which come from different bodies applying different criteria.
The declared list is among the longer ones in this catalogue. A component set this wide means the screen returns many individual ratings, and the composite accumulates a large number of small contributions instead of turning on a handful of entries. At this length the per-component table below is substantially more informative than the single figure, because the figure compresses a great deal of variation into one number.
Cross-brand screening score neighbourhood
How It Compares to Its Category
Among the 6,337 products we've scored in the Fats category, the average safety score is 99.8/100. Pimento cheese scores 49.8 points below that category average (50/100 vs. 99.8/100), so it is a comparatively weaker pick for shoppers screening within that category specifically, rather than against the product catalog as a whole.
Ingredient-list length vs other Fats products
Pimento cheese lists 45 ingredients on its label
45 99th percentile a longer ingredient list than 99% of the 788 products we track
Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more products. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Distribution as text
- 0–2
- 13 products (2%)
- 2–4
- 228 products (29%)
- 4–6
- 41 products (5%)
- 6–8
- 47 products (6%)
- 8–10
- 42 products (5%)
- 10–12
- 50 products (6%)
- 12–14
- 82 products (10%)
- 14–16
- 77 products (10%)
- 16–18
- 114 products (14%)
- 18–20
- 31 products (4%)
- 20–22
- 17 products (2%)
- 22–24
- 4 products (1%)
- 24–26
- 9 products (1%)
- 26–28
- 9 products (1%)
- 28–30
- 3 products (0%)
- 30–32
- 2 products (0%)
- 32–34
- 3 products (0%)
- 34–36
- 3 products (0%)
- 38–40
- 3 products (0%)
- 40 and above
- 10 products (1%)
Source Open Food Facts, product label ingredient lists · July 2026
Ingredient-list length is a descriptive property of the label, not a safety rating. A longer list is not automatically worse and a shorter one is not automatically better; the count is shown so the label can be placed against a comparable population. The comparison here runs against the 788 Fats products we publish with a parsed label, not against the whole catalogue, because list length varies far more between categories than within one.
Ingredient Safety Analysis
How the 50/100 score is built
Screening starts at 100 and subtracts severity-weighted FDA SAFFA / CSPI flags (2 flagged of 45 labeled). The floor is 0 when deductions exceed 100.
Full Ingredient List
Imitation salad cheese (water, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, starch, whey, casein and/or caseinate, salt, natural flavor, sodium citrate, sodium phosphate, sorbic acid [as a preservative], artificial color, lactic acid), salad dressing (soybean oil, water, high fructose corn syrup, distilled vinegar, modified corn starch, egg yolks, salt, less than 1/10 of 1% sodium benzoate, pimentos, water, jalapeno peppers (jalapeno peppers, water, vinegar, salt, calcium chloride), sweet bell peppers (bell peppers, water, citric acid), cheese sauce (whey, food starch-modified, cheddar cheese (pasteurized milk, cheese culture, salt, enzymes), salt, whey protein concentrate, less than 2% buttermilk solids, sodium phosphate, cream, lactic acid, yellow 5, yellow 6), whey, cheese flavor (dehydrated blend of cheese (granular and blue [milk, cheese culture, salt, enzymes], whey, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, whey protein concentrate, citric acid, lactic acid, yellow 5, yellow 6), potassium sorbate (as a preservative).
Categories
More from Ruth's
Mid-score cross-brand comparables for Pimento cheese
Neighbours outside Ruth's near Pimento cheese's mid-band score (50/100). The 2 same-brand links above stay within Ruth's; these peers cross brands.
Same mid-band screening score
Nearest cross-brand products by screening score (2 flagged of 45 on 0074952120147).
Long-label peers (21+ ingredients)
Nearest cross-brand labels by linked ingredient count (45 on 0074952120147).
Follow the flagged-label evidence
Follow the flagged-label evidence
Yellow 6 is the first flagged ingredient selected from Pimento cheese's parsed label. Start with that ingredient’s source context, then compare the rest of this 45-ingredient record.
- Inspect the FDA SAFFA and CSPI context attached to Yellow 6. Open Yellow 6
- Compare Pimento cheese's 2 flagged ingredients with a product from the same score neighbourhood. Compare labels
- Check how caution flags contribute to the derived screening score before drawing a dietary conclusion. Read the method
This page describes published ingredient-list and source coverage. It is not dietary or medical advice.
Barcode 0074952120147: product data from Open Food Facts (July 2026). Screening from FDA SAFFA and CSPI Chemical Cuisine where attached. Figures are computed from those sources, not editor-typed. Methodology. Reference only, not dietary or medical advice.