Consumer News

Is The Kasha Kosher? At The Birkett Mills, The Answer Is Yes

Founded in 1797, The Birkett Mills is the oldest and one of the primary millers of buckwheat in America. The company is located in Penn Yan, New York, and has been family owned for over 200 years. Originally the mill was water powered and it generated electricity for both milling of grain, but also for the village of Penn Yan until the village had its own source of electricity. The town was founded by Connecticut Yankees and Pennsylvania Dutch and thus got its name from both of these groups.

Stonyfield Leaves no Stone Unturned to Produce Delicious Taste of Oikos Organic Greek Yogurt

Stonyfield Farm, celebrating its 27th year, is the world’s leading organic yogurt company. Its all- natural and certified organic yogurt, smoothies, milk, cultured soy, frozen yogurt and ice cream are distributed nationally. The company advocates that healthy food can only come from a healthy planet. All of Stonyfield’s products are certified kosher by the Orthodox Union – a certification that symbolizes purity and quality, two attributes which are at the core of the company’s mission. Stonyfield chose to be certified by the OU because of the organization’s international respect — for being known to hold products to the highest standard possible.

Easy to Eat, Complex to Certify: Yogurt is a Favorite Food for the Cultured Among Us

Yogurt was first produced thousands of years ago. Dairy history and legend indicate that yogurt originated in Iran or Turkey. One story has it that an ancient Turk was carrying milk in his goatskin for some time, whereupon he noticed that the substance had developed into a thick, creamy mass (precipitated by the bacteria in the goatskin and the warm temperature).This new product was referred to as ‘yogurut’.

Rudolf Jelínek‘s 400-Year Tradition of Making Slivovitz Bears Fruit in the U.S.

Rudolf Jelínek is a joint stock company engaged in the production of alcoholic beverages and currently ranks among the major producers of fruit brandy in the world. The company was founded in 1894 and follows a 400–year-old tradition of slivovitz-making in Walachia, Czech Republic.

An OU Expert Finds He Can Go Home Again to a Town Where Both He and Scotch Have a History

My grandfather was what they call in the United States a “revenooer.” He was the excise man for the Scotch whisky distilleries in Campbeltown, a little town on the west coast of Scotland. I was born there and still vacation there. A little town now, but in its heyday it had more than 30 distilleries. There was a distillery/maltings not far away from our house, and as a little boy I routinely played in the maltings with the cats who “lived” in the barley. I retained an interest in Scotch whisky, including drinking it when I was old enough, and was thrilled when Rabbi Safran asked me to audit some distilleries which wanted OU kosher certification on their single malt whiskies. One of them was only a few miles over the water from my vacation cottage!

Food Matters: The Growth of Kosher

If you would have suggested to an observant Jew that in the earliest part of the 21st century our ancient diet would become one of the hottest new food trends and that the kosher food market would be amongst the fastest growing food sectors in America and Europe, you would surely have been rewarded with a bemused look worthy of an encounter with an inhabitant of the wistful land of Chelm, inhabited by a population of sweet, confused citizens who can make neither heads nor tails of anything.

ASKOU 10 Kosher Seminars Draw Participants from Near and Far

Where would you go if you wanted to learn the fine art of kashrut from experts, combining studies of the laws of kosher with the hands-on experiences that only those experts can provide? For dozens of rabbis and advanced rabbinical students this summer, the answer was the Orthodox Union.

Tomintoul Single Malt Whisky from the Scottish Highlands Announces OU KOSHER Certification

From the highest of the Scottish Highlands now come varieties of single malt whisky manufactured by Tomintoul Distillery and newly certified by OU Kosher. Tomintoul, located in the community of the same name, the highest village in the Highlands, is owned by Angus Dundee, an independent company with over 50 years’ experience in producing, blending, bottling and distributing top-quality Scotch whiskies and other spirits.

OU KOSHER Educational Materials Order List

Check item(s) being ordered. Compute total payment. Make checks payable to the Orthodox Union and mail with this completed order form to Rabbi Yosef Grossman c/o Orthodox Union, 11 Broadway, NYC, NY 10004.

OU Kosher Experts Provide Hands-On Knowledge for Advanced YU Rabbinical Students in June Workshops

OU Kosher brought its Harry H. Beren ASK OU Outreach program, Kashrut in the Community, to Yeshiva University’s Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS) for a well-received series of lectures and field trips to OU certified facilities for advanced rabbinical students.