system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5:Neither Cheddar Cheese or Butter is naturally Yellow. (In fact they're both white.) Why and when did they start adding food dye?

I've always wondered this. Things like candy or pastries it makes sense, but there's plenty of white cheeses. And Butter starts out as cream which is white to begin with. How did they even get the idea to add dye in the first place?
gpt
Grass fed butter is yellow, actually. Grass fed milk has a yellowish tint, too. Cheese made with high quality grass fed milk has an orange tint.

Annatto was added to cheddar as both a flavoring and a colorant so that inferior cheese could replicate the color of grass fed milk when using cheaper milk. This started in the 16th century or there about. It stuck around as tradition.