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Tuesday, December 09, 2008
OU Direct, the six-part website which OU Certified companies use to manage their accounts, became even more direct today with the enhancement of Online Ingredient Automation. This newest feature will enable companies to easily manage their Schedule A’s and add ingredients via the web – avoiding the paperwork that registering these ingredients used to entail.
Companies will be notified by e-mail within six business hours if their applications have been accepted or if further review is necessary. The ingredients are then available for view and printing on the company’s Schedule A (ingredient listing per plant).
The website, http://www.oudirect.org, includes each company’s Schedules A and B (Schedule B lists a company’s products); Letters of Certification (LOC) affirming that a product is certified kosher by the OU; a financial overview of the company’s account; applications for new plants, products and ingredients; variations of the famed OU symbol for use on labels; and the OU’s Universal Kosher Database (UKD), which contains a record of tens of thousands of products that are certified by the OU and participating kosher certifying agencies.
Now, with the development of the Online Ingredient Application, OU Direct has advanced even further in its state of the art capabilities.
“OU Direct has been extremely well received by our certified companies,” declared Rabbi Moshe Elefant, Chief Operating Officer of OU Kosher, who has played a major role in the development of OU Direct. “In our constant aim to better service our clients and to enhance our kosher certification programs, this new attractive feature on OU Direct will make those goals even more achievable.”
The operation of the Online Ingredient Application is very easy and provides the following benefits:
• Using very simple screens, the company applies for ingredients;
• Clients can select from thousands of OU approved ingredients on the Universal Kosher Database. The UKD contains close to 340,000 approved ingredients with more being added all the time. All products found on the UKD have been approved for use by the OU.
• Clients with multiple plants may view and select approved ingredients from their current Schedule A’s and attach them to their other facilities.
• Clients may apply for new ingredients by using a simple web form.
• Ability to upload attachments in various formats
Each ingredient is processed based on a series of validations and is either approved for use or referred to the OU Kosher rabbinic coordinator assigned to the company for further review. Companies will be notified via e-mail on the status of each ingredient. Newly applied-for ingredients will appear on the Schedule A within six business hours. The updated Schedule A can then be viewed on OU Direct.
The OU Direct Help Desk is available by phone or e-mail for any questions regarding the website. In addition, a Help Manual with instructions on how to utilize and take full advantage of the OU Direct website is available online.
The new feature is now up and running and available for use by the thousands of satisfied OU certified companies.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
The ASK OUTREACH program, which was specifically designed to put OU Kosher in contact with communities in the Torah world not part of its usual constituency, reached out in a most significant way last week, conducting a two-part hands-on session in kosherization for the Satmar Yoreh Deah Kollel of Kiryas Joel, NY.
ASK OUTREACH is made possible by funding from the Harry H. Beren Foundation of Lakewood, NJ.
Under the direction of Rabbi Yosef Grossman, OU Director of Kashrut Education, and with Rabbi Moshe Perlmutter of Passaic, NJ providing the training, OU Kosher went to the Satmar Talmud Torah’s kitchen – capable of serving 10,000 meals daily -- to illustrate foodservice kashering, performed in large kitchens such as those found in schools, hotels and catering establishments. The next day Rabbi Perlmutter demonstrated industrial kashering, performed in plants and factories, at Oasis Food Company in Hillside, N.J., manufacturers of margarine and other condiments.
Some 20 members of the kollel, what Rabbi Grossman called “a very learned group,” participated. According to Rabbi Grossman, the group could have been as large as 100, based on interest in the community, if there had been space to accommodate them.
Outreach to Satmar follows similar approaches to Chabad Lubavitch, Belz, Bobov, Vichnitz and Skver Chasidim, among other groups. “It was only a matter of time before we got to Satmar,” Rabbi Grossman said. “We were approached to demonstrate kashering. Rabbi Perlmutter has great expertise in this area.”
In its study of Jewish law, the Satmar kollel seeks out practical applications of everything kollel members study, thus leading to the request to the OU.
“It is clear,” declared Rabbi Menachem Genack, CEO of OU Kosher, “that in the Torah world, we have much more in common than what sets us apart. The range of communities that have availed themselves of ASK OUTREACH is living proof that the OU’s expertise spans the Jewish world, and that respect for our knowledge and its practical applications is a unifying force in the observant community.”
Back in Kiryas Joel, the session in the Satmar kitchen, focusing on ovens, pots, kettles and other items, emphasized how to make a treif vessel kosher; as Rabbi Grossman pointed out, everything in the Satmar kitchen was kosher, but the techniques could still be demonstrated.
“We received a very warm reception at Kiryas Joel and were made to feel right at home,” Rabbi Grossman said. He was pleased to see the OU symbol on food items in the Satmar kitchen.
“We were very pleased to reach out to Satmar in our ongoing efforts to develop relationships with all segments of the Torah world who would like to benefit from our services,” Rabbi Grossman said. “We hope this approach to the Satmar community will be ongoing in future areas of mutual benefit.”
Rabbi Perlmutter agreed. He noted that in kosherizing seminars he gives for the OU, this was “the only time it was totally Satmar and on their home turf, in their kitchen, with their own mashgiach participating.”
Summing up their knowledge of kosher law as “phenomenal,” he said, “We both learned a lot from each other.”
Thursday, September 04, 2008
They came from Jerusalem and they came from Brooklyn, and from Berlin and Paris which are roughly in between the two. Others came from Las Vegas, from Providence, Rhode Island and from Grand Rapids, Michigan, which is also roughly between the two.
Twenty came from Lakewood and others from Monsey and New Square, NY, bastions of Judaism; smaller Jewish communities such as Indianapolis, Indiana and Scranton and Allentown in Pennsylvania were represented as well.
Besides Brooklyn, Kew Gardens Hills in New York was well represented. New Jersey communities included Cherry Hill, Springfield and West Orange. Philadelphia joined Scranton and Allentown in the Pennsylvania delegation.
Take a map, look for a Jewish community, and chances are that it was represented at the recently concluded ASKOU9 program of OU Kosher, intensive kashrut education for future mashgichim and for those already active in their communities who came to strengthen their skills.
The yeshivot and kollelim whose students participated were among the finest institutions of Jewish learning in the world. They included Beth Medrash Govoha in Lakewood, which sent the 20 Chavrei HaKollel, the largest delegation ever from Lakewood to an ASKOU program. The Yeshivas Beis Zion of the Lauder Yeshurun Foundation in Berlin sent two young rabbis who returned home fortified with the skills to strengthen kashrut in Central and Eastern Europe. The Mirer Yeshiva Kollel in Jerusalem and the Philadelphia Community Kollel sent students. The RIETS rabbinical seminary at Yeshiva University was well-represented at the program.
Kollelim at Mesivta Tiferet Jerusalem of the Lower East Side, NYC; Bais Medrash L’Talmud and Ohr HaChaim in Kew Gardens Hills, Queens, NY; and Emek Halacha, Yeshivas Derech Chaim and Belz in Brooklyn, NY all sent students.
ASKOU9 was divided into two programs – a three-week kashrut internship with 26 participants including rabbis, rabbinical and kollel students; and a one-week kashrut training program with 70 participants including community rabbis, assistant rabbis and students, as well as for members of local Va’adim HaKashrut. The two groups combined in the final week of the three-week session.
“We were amazed at the high caliber and diversity of the ASKOU participants,” declared Rabbi Yosef Grossman, OU Director of Kashrut Education, who coordinated the programs. “They literally came to ASKOU from the four corners of the Torah and kashrut world. Many of the participants were noted Torah scholars and authors. It was a privilege to host such a distinguished and diversified group of upcoming future Torah leaders.”
Together, the groups participated in lectures from OU experts, and went on the road to plants, slaughterhouses, restaurants and catering halls certified by the OU. Their responses showed the value of the program.
When asked how he liked the three-week session, Shmuel Kruk, a semicha student in Lakewood, responded enthusiastically, “I loved it.” Rabbi Avrumi Tannenbaum, a member of a Brooklyn kollel and a one-week ASK OU participant, commented that the program was “excellent, informative, and unbelievable to receive a service from an organization of this sort.” Yehuda Gras, another one week participant remarked, “Fabulously run with military precision and fantastic, fascinating lectures!” All this from someone who has taken the program for the third time! Apparently he really loves it.
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