The extremely quick substitute I use, that can have cheese like consistency but doesn’t really taste like it, is olive oil and nutritional yeast, mixed to whatever consistency you like.

personally I don’t think any of them taste like dairy , they taste like a cheesy imitation like how wosits (if you live in UK) or cheetoes taste (US )(both are cheesy flavour crisps if you live outside both these areas ) I believe the majority of companies use nutritional yeast to create the imitation cheesiness and to simulate the fat content found in actually cheese they use coconut or similar nut oils /products . But as far as it smelling like dairy it doesn’t even have a whiff of milk about it .

To be honest before going vegan I was never a big fan of cheese. I liked the basic mozzarella and cheddar but that was about it. Many vegan cheeses smell overly cheesy in my opinion. I really struggled with vegan cheeses but there are a few that are a lot more subtle. In the UK with have Violife which I think is fairly subtle compared to most other vegan cheeses. They do spreadable cheese and meltable cheese. I can’t say much for products outside the UK.

IMO potato cheese doesn’t smell or taste like cheese, it only has the consistency but it tastes potato and any other thing you put it in. When I did it I used powdered onion and garlic with some other species.

Wouldn’t anything that still somewhat looks like cheese still trigger the same response? I have my doubts that it is the actual taste, but probably rather the look and texture of it?

I have a case which doesn’t taste like cheese (well, i didn’t test every type of cheese before going vegan but it is not like dairy one) but it doesn’t melt or spread like it. It breaks if you warm it easily but tastes better as additional ingredient in a hamburger, for example.

I am not sure where you live but it is sold in both Lidl and Carrefour in Spain.

I fear that is only sold in Spain because it’s made here.