We Taste-Tasted 12 Sour Creams—Here Are Our Favorites

I have never been inclined to eat a spoonful of sour cream on its own—and yet, I never leave the grocery store without it. A tub of sour cream has myriad uses, including dolloping on baked potatoes and bowls of chili, folding into cake batter, and making creamy sauces and dips. The question is: Which sour cream is worth buying? To find out, the Serious Eats team tasted 12 different sour creams you’re likely to find at your local supermarket. We placed each into bowls, then sampled them without knowing which sour cream was which. After our editors tasted their way through 12 bowls of sour cream, we tabulated the results and crowned an overall winner we’d be happy to top our nachos with or incorporate into our favorite dip—and maybe even eat by the spoonful like we did in our taste tests. We also identified a couple of very good runners up.

The Criteria

Sour cream should be creamy, tangy, and smooth. It should not be thin, watery, or gummy, nor should it be so stodgy that you suspect you’ve purchased cream cheese. It should be just thick enough to dollop, hold its shape well, and have a glossy sheen. It should taste like cultured cream—nice and tart—but not so much that it runs the risk of tasting rancid. It should also not be excessively sweet, because…sweet nachos? No thank you.

Overall Winner

Stop & Shop Sour Cream

Every editor who participated in this taste-test gave Stop & Shop’s store-brand sour cream a glowing review. Our associate editorial director Megan thought it was “very thick and lusciously creamy,” with a pleasant, mild tanginess. Like Megan, our editorial director Daniel and associate visuals director Amanda enjoyed its full body and tart flavor.

Runners Up

The Best Nationally Available Sour Cream: Daisy Sour Cream

If you don’t live near a Stop & Shop, you can’t go wrong with this sour cream, which was an all around crowd pleaser in our taste test. “Good and creamy and mildly tangy,” Megan wrote. Like our winning pick, Daisy sour cream has just the right amount of tang, with a smooth texture that is thick and scoopable. The Daisy sour cream’s ingredient list consists of just cultured cream, while some others we tested also contain enzymes that encourage coagulation or thickeners such as nonfat milk solids.

The Best Organic Sour Cream: Organic Valley Sour Cream

Daniel thought this tasted “classic” and appreciated its glossiness. Though it was thick enough to dollop, it was slightly thinner than the other sour creams we tried. This was a plus for Megan, who thought it was “quite sour and tangy,” with a looser texture that she actually liked. This thinner texture is likely because Organic Valley’s sour cream is made with both nonfat milk and cream, whereas many other sour creams are made with just cultured cream.

The Contenders

• 365 Organic Sour Cream
• Alexandre Family Farms A2/A2 Organic Sour Cream
• Bowl & Basket Natural Sour Cream
• Breakstone’s All Natural Sour Cream
• Daisy Sour Cream
• Fage All Natural Sour Cream
• Friendship Dairies Sour Cream
• Good & Gather Sour Cream
• Good Culture Sour Cream
• Organic Valley Sour Cream
• Stop & Shop Sour Cream
• Wegman’s Sour Cream

In Conclusion

Overall, our editors enjoyed most of the sour cream brands we sampled—in fact there were only a few we wouldn’t gladly eat again. Most of the sour creams we tasted contain just two or three ingredients—cultured cream, enzymes, and friendly bacteria such as acidophilus and bifidus cultures—though some contain milk, nonfat milk, and/or milk solids. All of our winners had a good balance of tanginess and rich creaminess and steered clear of the dreaded sweetness.

Our Testing Methodology

All taste tests are conducted with brands completely hidden and without discussion. Tasters taste samples in random order. For example, taster A may taste sample one first, while taster B will taste sample six first. This is to prevent palate fatigue from unfairly giving any one sample an advantage. Tasters are asked to fill out tasting sheets ranking the samples for various criteria. All data is tabulated and results are calculated with no editorial input in order to give us the most impartial representation possible.