Foods

Dyes in yogurt, flavored milk and cheese

Dairy is one of the least colored categories, but strawberry milk, kids' yogurt tubes and some cheeses still carry dyes.

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Yogurt, milk and cheese: products whose label lists a tracked dye or additive

902 of 30,279

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USDA FoodData Central, Branded Foods, release of 2026-10-29. The label date is when the record was submitted: recipes change, so check the package in your hand.

Yogurt, milk and milk substitutes, and cheese make 30,279 products in the USDA data, but only 3% list a tracked dye or additive, the lowest share of any category here. When dyes appear, it is mostly Red 40, on 2% of labels, in strawberry milk, kids' yogurt and fruit-on-the-bottom cups, with Yellow 5, Yellow 6 and Blue 1 each under one percent. Cheese is usually colored with annatto, a color exempt from certification that no state law covers, which is why orange cheddar rarely appears in the counts. Titanium dioxide is on 0% of labels, in some coated or whitened products. Flavored milk and yogurt are staples of school meals, so the state school rules apply to them from each date.

How common is this ingredient in a food category?

Yogurt, milk and cheese whose label lists Red 40

1.7%

Products listing it509
Products in the category30,279

USDA FoodData Central, Branded Foods; labels were submitted over several years and recipes change.

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Laws and FDA orders read by Radif Partners · Editorial policy · Method and sources

Strawberry milk at school

A school that serves strawberry milk colored with Red 40 must switch in states with a school rule, from each start date; beet juice or carmine are the usual replacements. Carmine, made from insects, is a color exempt from certification and must be named on the label. The school meal page compares the states.

What the labels list, substance by substance

30,279 products, 30,251 with an ingredient list; USDA FoodData Central, Branded Foods, release of October 29, 2026.
SubstanceProductsShare of the category
Red 405091.7%
Red 3560.2%
Yellow 52510.8%
Yellow 62470.8%
Blue 12450.8%
Blue 2360.1%
Potassium bromate10.0%
Propylparaben40.0%
Titanium dioxide1370.5%
BHA70.0%

Questions people ask

How many yogurt, milk and cheese products were counted, and how recent are their labels?

30,279 products, one per barcode, from the USDA FoodData Central Branded Foods release of October 29, 2026. 902 of them list at least one of the 14 substances tracked here. Most labels in the data set were filed in 2021 to 2023, so recipes may have changed since.

Which dye is listed most often in yogurt, milk and cheese?

Red 40, on 509 labels or 1.7% of the category, followed by Yellow 5 (251) and Yellow 6 (247). A product often lists several at once, so the counts overlap. The table on this page gives every tracked substance. Counts come from the labels, not from tests of the products themselves.

Are yogurt, milk and cheese with these dyes legal to sell?

Yes, in stores, except for substances whose federal date has passed, such as BVO, or will pass, such as Red 3 on January 15, 2027, and from January 1, 2027 for the four substances of California's Food Safety Act in that state. School rules in several states limit what schools serve or sell, not what stores sell.

Check next

Foods with Red 40

Search US products whose label lists Red 40 or another tracked dye, by category, from USDA FoodData Central, with each label's date.

Ingredient list checker

Paste an ingredient list: every tracked dye or additive found, by FD&C name, lake, E or INS number, with its status in your state.

Dye laws by state

Pick a state and a dye or additive: the FDA rule, every state law that names it, and the date each one starts.

Natural food colors

The colors exempt from certification that replace synthetic dyes, the new ones the FDA approved since 2025, and two still on hold.

Laws and official pages behind this page

Written by

Independent publisher of a state-by-state tracker of food dye and additive laws in the United States, with an ingredient-list checker built on USDA FoodData Central

Laws and FDA orders checked on · Editorial policy · Contact

Food dye and additive rules 2026, read in each state law and in the Federal Register, last checked on