Milk is White, So Why is Cheese Yellow or Orange?

Cheese is made of milk, which is white, but many of our cheeses are shades of yellow passing into orange. Cow's milk contains beta carotene from the grass they eat, which is orange. The real question should be why milk is white in the first place. Sheep's milk doesn't have nearly as much beta carotene as the milk from cows, which is why cheese made from sheep's milk is almost always white. That same beta carotene is the reason butter from cow's milk is yellow. We really should qualify the assertion by saying cheese made from high quality milk from grass-fed cows is yellow-orange, but cheesemakers have found a way around the question of color (and quality) by making cheese any color they want. People expect a yellowish or orangish cheese, so that's what they will get, one way or another. This video contains a 70-second skippable promotion at 1:05. -via Laughing Squid