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Saturday, January 01, 2005
High about Cayuga’s waters, on the beautiful campus of Cornell University with its 4,000 Jewish students, 104 West! (formerly Cornell Kosher Dining), is the only campus dining facility supervised by the OU. This supervision is but one aspect of the Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (JLIC) program at Cornell sponsored by the OU and staffed by this author and his wife, Rivky Ross.
The 104 West! facility is one of many kosher foodservice operations managed by Flik Independent Schools. According to Flik President Ray Mulligan, “With the OU symbol displayed in our dining hall as well as on all of our retail products, we have eliminated any questions about the level of kashrut we adhere to. Rabbi Joshua Ross, our OU supervisory rabbi, is a pleasure to work with and has guided us through this process painlessly.”
As Colleen Wright-Riva, Director of Cornell Dining and Retail Services commented, “Cornell Dining is delighted to have the Orthodox Union, the premier kashrut certification agency in the United States, present
on our campus. The OU brings a level of supervision to Cornell that enables us to meet the needs of Jewish students, as well as others who trust the OU symbol, as a guarantee that their dietary needs are being taken care of. We know that we are one of the few campuses in the country to offer such a high quality program.”
“Through the expertise of our on-site rabbinical authority,” Ms. Wright-Riva said, “Cornell students can be assured that whether they adhere to kosher each and every day, or if they are enjoying the experience during an important holiday, kosher foods are offered in a variety of
locations across campus. We are pleased and proud that hot kosher meals are served daily at two locations on campus, 104West! and North Star.”
The Dining Hall known as 104 West!, which is open year round, serves a full dairy breakfast with fresh waffles, pastries, yogurt and cereal, just to mention a few options. Lunch is also dairy and has an open grill that serves up everything from quesadillas to tuna melts. You can have stir fry to your specification, or avail yourself of the regular
entrees. Dinner is almost always meat and the offerings range from wings to stroganoff.
On Shabbat, up to three hundred people converge to consume what we consider the best food on any campus, bar none. An additional “satellite” kosher station was established in 2000 to serve the needs of first year students, who are all assigned campus housing for their first year on North Campus, a twenty-minute walk from the Kosher Dining Hall. The station, situated among a variety of other concessions at Cornell’s North Star Cafeteria, serves a meat lunch and dinner. It draws a huge crowd, especially when there is a carving station.
As Adam Daum, the president of Cornell Hillel told me, “Between Shabbat dinners for 300 people and the ability to get a kosher pastrami sandwich anywhere on campus, kosher at Cornell has definitely made a huge positive difference in my four years here!”
The Flik staff also prepares packaged salads and sushi for sale all over campus. LeNorman J. Strong, Assistant Vice President for Student and Academic Services, made it clear that, “Having an authentic kosher program on campus is important to Cornell University’s commitment of providing quality and diversity in its programs and services. Having the Orthodox Union as our partner in
developing the kosher program has enabled us to meet our educational and culinary goals. Cornell University has benefited from the expertise of the OU staff. We are looking forward to continuing our partnership as we work to grow the kosher program at Cornell University.”
Supervising all of this food preparation is this author, a campus rabbi employed by the OU’s JLIC program. Rivky and I share the primary goal of satisfying the needs and raising the aspirations of students who identify as observant. A secondary, though also vital goal, is to
offer Jewish learning to the larger Jewish community at Cornell. (See sidebar for further details of the JLIC program.)
104 West! is designed to be a serious kosher facility. It has separate dairy and meat kitchens, separate coolers and freezers, as well as a designated pareve room for most baking needs. Attention to kashrut at 104 West! entails opening the kitchen and lighting flames for the
non-Jewish staff every morning at 6:45; entering the kitchen at regular intervals throughout the day to ensure adherence to kashrut guidelines; checking vegetables and/or blanching before they are put out; sealing and signing shipments to the North Star facility at least
twice each day; checking food orders for kosher certification as they are received; and locking down the facility each evening once dinner has been served.
I also oversee a team of student mashgichim (koshersupervisors) who staff the North Star kosher station, making sure that no outside food or utensils enter the station. In addition, this author is a member of several Cornell committees dedicated to the management and
improvement of kosher services on campus. Topics of discussion include promotion of 104 West! and its affiliated programs; pricing of meals; administration of check-in and other logistical concerns.
Another important service provided by the kosher dining program
is holiday meals, which are often served off-premises to accommodate
larger crowds. This includes Cornell’s Super Seder, a behemoth project
for which planning begins in September. A special arrangement was
made with the Statler, Cornell’s hotel (Cornell has the best hotel school in North America), where families could stay at a special rate if
they were coming for the seders. A wonderful brochure was designed,
and the Super Seder was marketed like a Passover vacation package.
The room was cut into quadrants by balloons and shrubbery, curtains
were put up and students were greeted by a giant wave of blue helium balloons on either side of them as they entered the hall. Everyone was very enthusiastic about the aesthetics. The hall was set up to have 40 separate seders, with 20 people at each table.
The Super Seder was a massive massive success. With over 925, participants we had what was unquestionably the largest seder in North
America. We even managed to get almost the entire room to sing Mah
Nishtana (the Four Questions) together.
Marty Rauker, Special Assistant for Campus Life had this to say:
“Having an OU certified kosher dining program on our campus has been a real catalyst for energizing Jewish life at Cornell. For example, the campus-wide Super Seder on the first night of Passover in the spring of 2004 would have been beyond anyone’s imagination only three years ago. Now we are planning for next year and expect it to
be an even bigger event.”
Suffice to say that the success of the kosher program will only continue to grow at Cornell.
Thursday, December 30, 2004
We, at the OU, have received several phone calls asking to explain the purpose of the second cut done at Agriprocessors.
There are two reasons for this cut: kosher and commercial. The additional cut into the carotid arteries accelerates the flow of blood and its depletion from the animal and that helps facilitate a more effective, subsequent, salting (melicha). It also improves the quality of the meat by avoiding blood spotting.
The second cut into the carotid arteries, though halachically significant, need not be done by a “shochet” (as explained in Yoreh Deah, Siman 22).
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Many people expressed concern about the standards for humane treatment of animals at a kosher slaughterhouse after viewing a well-publicized video of kosher slaughter at the AgriProcessors plant in Iowa, which was released by the animal rights organization PETA. Any slaughterhouse, whether kosher or non-kosher, is by definition a disconcerting, blood-filled and gruesome place. Torah law, however, is most insistent about not inflicting needless pain on animals and in emphasizing humane treatment of all living creatures.
Kosher slaughter, shechita, involves cutting the trachea and esophagus with a sharp, flawless knife. At the same time, the carotid arteries, which are the primary supplier of blood to the brain, are severed. The profound loss of blood and the massive drop in blood pressure render the animal insensate almost immediately. Studies done by Dr. H. H. Dukes at the Cornell University School of Veterinary Medicine indicate that the animal is unconscious within seconds of the incision.
After the shechita at AgriProcessors, an additional cut is made in the carotid arteries to further accelerate the bleeding. This is not done for kashrut reasons, for after the trachea and esophagus have been severed the shechita is complete, but rather for commercial reasons, to avoid blood splash, which turns the meat a darker color. The carotid arteries are attached to the trachea and at AgriProcessors the trachea was excised to facilitate the bleeding.
In the overwhelming number of cases the animal is insensate at that time. However and inevitably, particularly when it is considered that 18,000 cattle were slaughtered during the seven-week period when the video was shot, there was a tiny percentage of animals whose carotid arteries were not completely severed so they were not completely unconscious. Although this is very infrequent, the removal of the trachea immediately after the shechita has now been discontinued.
It should be kept in mind that in a non-kosher plant, when the animal is killed by a shot with a captive bolt to the brain, it often has to be re-shot, sometimes up to six times, before the animal collapses. The USDA permits up to a five percent initial failure rate.
At AgriProcessors and at other plants it supervises, the Orthodox Union is committed to maintaining the highest ritual standards of shechita without compromising the halacha (Jewish law) one bit. The OU continues to vouch for the kashrut, which was never compromised, of all the meat prepared by AgriProcessors,
As I indicated previously, images of slaughter – especially selected images in an abbatoir—are jarring, particularly to the layman. Statements by PETA that animals were bellowing in pain after the shechita are an anatomical impossibility. After the animal’s throat and larynx have been cut, it cannot vocalize.
PETA is well known for the passion it brings to the issue of animal rights, but it is an organization devoid of objectivity. PETA’s comparison of the killing of chickens to the Holocaust is, at a minimum, morally obtuse. So to whom should we turn for an objective view about the situation at AgriProcessors and about kosher slaughter in general? Here are the opinions of some experts:
1. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Patty Judge inspected the plant. She found the handling of the animals to be humane and commendable. She said, after viewing the shechita, that the animals were unconscious within two to three seconds. She also said that chickens were handled more carefully by the rabbis than by her own “grandmother on the farm.”
2. AgriProcessors is under constant USDA inspection. Dr. Henry Lawson, the USDA veterinarian at the plant, told me that he considers the treatment of the cattle at AgriProcessors to be humane and that the shechita renders them unconscious within a matter of seconds. He determines this by certain physiological criteria related to the eyes, tongue and tail of the animal.
3. Rabbi Dr. I.M. Levinger, a veterinarian and one of the world’s foremost experts on animal welfare and kosher slaughter, called the shechita practices at AgriProcessors “professional and efficient,” emphasizing the humane manner in which the shechita was handled. Dr. Levinger was also highly impressed with the caliber of the ritual slaughterers. He issued his evaluation following a thorough two-day on-site review of shechita practices and animal treatment at the plant. He viewed the kosher slaughter of nearly 150 animals.
4. AgriProcessors has hired an animal welfare and handling specialist to evaluate the plant processes. The specialist was recommended by both Dr. Temple Grandin, a foremost expert in animal welfare, and also by the National Meat Association. In reviewing the shechita process last week, the specialist made the following observations:
· The shechita process was performed swiftly and correctly;
· The shechita cut resulted in a rapid bleed; and
· All animals that exited the box were clearly unconscious.
The OU and AgriProcessors are committed to the Torah principles of humane treatment of animals. At the OU we constantly review our procedures, evaluate them, and if necessary, improve or correct them. We don’t want ever to be wedded to a mistaken procedure. AgriProcessors has been completely cooperative in working with the OU and shares our philosophy.
As Torah Jews, we are imbued with the teachings which require animals to be rested along with people on the Sabbath and fed before the people who own them, and that the mother bird must be sent away before her young are taken to save her grief. These and similar statutes make it clear that inhumane treatment of animals is not the Jewish way.
Kosher slaughter, by principle, and as performed today in the United States, is humane. Indeed, as PETA itself has acknowledged, shechita is more humane than the common non-kosher form of shooting the animal in the head with a captive bolt, for reasons noted above. The Humane Slaughter Act, passed into law after objective research by the United States government, declares shechita to be humane. For Torah observant Jews, it cannot be any other way.
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