Abstract The viscoelasticity of reduced-fat Cheddar and Mozzarella cheeses was characterized in small (parallel disk rheometer, go = 0.01) and large (sliding plate rheometer, 0.2< go <7) amplitude oscillatory shear at 40 and 60˚C. We deduced the linear relaxation spectrum from the small strain measurements. At large strain amplitudes, we found sinusoidal stress responses whose amplitudes are well below those predicted from the linear relaxation spectrum, and yet remarkably linear with strain amplitude. We call this the large strain linear regime. We discovered that the Lodge rubberlike liquid can quantitatively explain the large strain linear regime if we scale down the relaxation moduli in the linear spectrum by a constant. This large strain linear regime persists to much higher strain amplitudes for Cheddar (go £ 4) than for Mozzarella (go £ 1). This is perhaps due to oriented structure of the protein matrix in the Mozzarella cheese.