Cheese
for cheese
lovers.

The Tillamook Cheddar recipe is based on over 100 years of cheese-making experience. Our Tillamook Cheddar Cheese recipe contains four natural ingredients: cultured milk, enzymes (rennet), salt, and annatto. Annatto is a natural coloring extracted from the seeds of annatto trees grown in the tropics; it is responsible for that beautiful Tillamook Cheddar yellow color! Tillamook white cheddars only contain three ingredients, as they don’t need the annatto.

The exciting answer: cheesy magic! The less-exciting truth: annatto, a natural, plant-based food coloring extracted from the seeds of tropical annatto trees. Without annatto, cheese is the color of milk. Coloring has been added to cheddar cheese for centuries to regulate color variations in milk that can come from seasonal changes in the cow’s diet. These days, annatto helps ensure that each loaf of Tillamook cheese is the same color that our fans have come to expect. If you prefer a cheese that does not contain annatto, we also produce several white cheddar cheeses, too! Annatto does not affect the flavor of the cheese.

Tillamook Cheese is available at a variety of stores throughout the U.S. Currently, the full product line is most commonly found in the Pacific Northwest. To look for Tillamook Cheese and other products in your area, please visit Where to Buy. Because we sell our cheese to grocery stores through distributors, it’s sometimes difficult for us to know exactly which type of Tillamook Cheese is currently stocked in a specific store. If you’re looking for a particular flavor of cheese, we recommend that you call a store to check on their cheese inventory. You can also purchase most of our cheeses and cheese curds from our online store. If you would like to be able to purchase Tillamook products at a store that doesn’t currently carry them, we recommend speaking to the store manager and requesting our products.