On 2016-01-06 7:59 AM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

>> That was my original reaction too, but I *like* sharp cheddar and so I
>> supposed that was what it was. Rewatching the segment I realize that
>> the cheese being used is only the palest yellow. I suspect it's not
>> the sharp kind in other words.
>
> Why do you think it is not sharp? Color? Natural cheese is very pale
> in color no matter how sharp. In some areas of the country they add
> beta carotene because people think it is supposed to be orange
> colored.

My wife loves sharp cheddar and most of her favourites are white. For
some reason, people expect cheddar to be orange, which, as you say, is
dyed.

Dave Smith wrote:
> On 2016-01-06 7:59 AM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
>
>>> That was my original reaction too, but I *like* sharp cheddar and so I
>>> supposed that was what it was. Rewatching the segment I realize that
>>> the cheese being used is only the palest yellow. I suspect it's not
>>> the sharp kind in other words.
>>
>> Why do you think it is not sharp? Color? Natural cheese is very pale
>> in color no matter how sharp. In some areas of the country they add
>> beta carotene because people think it is supposed to be orange
>> colored.
>
> My wife loves sharp cheddar and most of her favourites are white. For
> some reason, people expect cheddar to be orange, which, as you say, is
> dyed.
>
>

Blame the Englies:

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/...-cheese-orange

As near as cheese historians can make out, the practice originated many
years ago in England. Milk contains varying amounts of beta-carotene,
the yellow-orange stuff found in carrots and other vegetables. Milk from
pasture-fed cows has higher beta-carotene levels in the spring and
summer, when the cows are munching on fresh grass, and lower levels
during the fall and winter, when they're eating hay. Thus the natural
color of the cheese varies over the course of a year.

So cheese makers began adding coloring agents. Nowadays the most common
of these is annatto, a yellow-red dye made from the seeds of a tree of
the same name. Dyeing the cheese eliminated seasonal color fluctuations
and also played to the fact (or anyway the belief) that spring/summer
milk had a higher butterfat content than the fall/winter kind and thus
produced more flavorful cheese.

Figuring if yellow = good, orange = better, some cheese makers began
ladling in the annatto in double handfuls, producing cheese that looked
like something you'd want to carve into a jack-o'-lantern. In recent
years some smaller operations have rebelled and stopped using colorants.
Be forewarned €” according to one cheese making text, uncolored cheese is
a "sordid, unappetizing melange of dirty yellow." But it's real.