Teacher told my daughter OUD is OK to eat. Is it?

Faigy86

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 3:19 pm

amother wrote:

Not OP.

But can someone explain to me how you don't consider OUD to be treif but consider it not to be following halacha (by believing Cholov Yisroel is halacha, you would be believing, by default, that anyone keeping OUD is not keeping halacha?)?

Basic summary of the issue as far as I understand it.

Chalav Yisrael is a gezeiras chachamim. It had been upheld in all countries until recently when R' Moshe determined that because of government standards and monitoring, it was permissible to drink/eat milk that did not have the additional supervision from the time of the milking. Some view this as a leniency in halacha, if it is too hard to get chalav yisrael, while others view it as basic halacha and perfectly permissible. According to the first view, chalav yisrael is halacha, while those who eat/drink chalav stam are availing themselves of a leniency, while according to the second view, it is basic halacha to eat chalav stam, and chalav yisrael is closer to a chumra (I think).

there are also those Rabbanim who never accepted the reasoning behind allowing chalav stam, and for people who follow those rabbanim, chalav stam isn't kosher. (Is it lubavitchers that are makpid like this - maybe someone can tell me)

I hope that clarified something - If I'm wrong - someone can correct me.

shabri

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 3:53 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

amother wrote:

CY uses different cows? I thought it just meant a Jew watches the milk.

Yes they do. On the farms that produce the milk for CY the cows the problematic veterinary procedures are removed so that they are not included in the milk.

I am very familiar with this -- DH runs the biggest CY company outside of the East Coast, which serves most of the middle US and much of the west, parts of the south, etc. The Nirbateur is their Rav Hamachshir.

Interesting. I know that Rav Schechternone of the Rossi yeshiva of YU as well as a posek for the ou holds that all milk is essentially trief because of those milking procedures and using needles to remove gas from the cows. He does not differentiate between chalav yisrael and chalav stam. Seems to think they all have these issues.

He does not hold this way for the klal but he himself will not have any dairy. Not chalav yisrael not chalav stam.
I have heard this all from him personally

Interestingly was that I thought Rav belsky was the one in ou who held it was ok.

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 4:00 pm

shabri wrote:

Please don't get what I said wrong. Rav Belsky indeed holds that Chalav Stam is okay. What I said is that he did not dispute the reasoning of the Nirbatur (who holds that it is not okay) but said that he had other reasons to pasken that it is okay.

I have also heard what you said about Rav Schechter. I understand that he accepted this as chumra upon himself when people started to hear about these veterinary problems (which when initially discovered did effect CY companies as well). CY companies have (for quite a while) gotten rid of the problematic cows and resolved that issue.

someoneoutthere

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 5:11 pm

No one thinks pig's milk is being added. In fact, the milk referred to is camel's milk. Milking pigs isn't too easy...
The idea is NON-KOSHER milk, from whatever source, could potentially be added. When Kashrus doesn't figure into your life, there is greater room for doing things not-100% according to kosher laws and not being too bothered by it or excusing it. Just a reality.

As for the animals used not being kosher, it's a big problem. Some companies/hechsheirim even in the CY industry are more makpid on it than others. But a majority of milking cows have had a procedure done to relieve air in the stomach which renders them treif. If you know for a fact that the cow you're getting milk from is a treife animal, you have serious kashrus issues. I'm curious if OOTBubby can share how this issue is dealt with, aside from the obvious separating of the animals. Do they rely on bittul?

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 5:15 pm

someoneoutthere wrote:

I'm curious if OOTBubby can share how this issue is dealt with, aside from the obvious separating of the animals. Do they rely on bittul?

I just asked DH. He said that those problematic cows on the farm are kept in an isolated pen. The mashgiach supervises when the cows are brought from the pens to the milking and only cows in the pens that he allows in are used. No bittul -- problematic cows (determined by a combination of the vet and the mashgiach) are removed from any milking completely.

DH says that the farms generally try to get rid of these problematic cows when they can. But until they do so, they are isolated and not used as explained above.

ElTam

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 5:22 pm

I personally know people who are very makpid on CY who hold that OUD is fine as long as the item is parve and it is strictly an issue of being made on dairy equipment. They are going by their rav on this issue, not making their own psak.

And as someone who lost her mother at a very young age and had a stepparent come in, I think you need to talk to DH and have him tread very, very lightly when it comes to overruling what your children are used to from their father. Of my siblings, I am the only one who has spoken to my father in the last 10 years. My father and I also had a very long period of not speaking. There were many issues in play in our break, but the new wife coming in and basically attempting to wipe out our dead mother's existence was very key. I'm not saying your current husband should stop keeping CY or that you shouldn't keep CY, but your children have already lost their father's presence. If they feel that your current Dh is undermining their connection to their departed father, you will have a much, much bigger problem on your hands.

merelyme

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 5:24 pm

someoneoutthere wrote:

My friend from Chile says they add pig milk to the cows' milk there.

Barbara

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 6:59 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

someoneoutthere wrote:

I'm curious if OOTBubby can share how this issue is dealt with, aside from the obvious separating of the animals. Do they rely on bittul?

Cows need to be milked every day. What are they doing on Shabbat and Yom Tov?

And how are they milking those "problematic" cows, who need to be milked, even if you wouldn't consider their milk to be kosher?

Barbara

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 7:03 pm

merelyme wrote:

someoneoutthere wrote:

My friend from Chile says they add pig milk to the cows' milk there.

Of course, I'm relying upon OU's and various rabbinic authorities' evaluation of laws and government supervision of dairy production in the US, not Chile.

But I really doubt that anyone, anywhere, is adding pig or camel or rabbit milk to the cow milk.

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 7:05 pm

Barbara wrote:

OOTBubby wrote:

someoneoutthere wrote:

I'm curious if OOTBubby can share how this issue is dealt with, aside from the obvious separating of the animals. Do they rely on bittul?

The farm also produces milk that is not marketed as CY. There is a schedule for milking and kashering (so everything is kashered only after 24 hours of non-use and to 212-degrees) and milking outside of the times they will be using it for CY is marketed (in totally different places) with their own label and isn't CY.

saw50st8

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 7:40 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

amother wrote:

I don't totally understand your question, but I can say that those that hold that Cholov Stam is Cholov Treife do hold OUD to be treife. Those that hold there is a heter for Cholov Stam do not hold OUD to be treife.

I have never heard people who only eat chalav yisrael call OUD treif.

Its kind of like how I would never eat Starkist tuna for kashrus reasons, but would never call it treif, even though its very halachically problematic.

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 7:45 pm

saw50st8 wrote:

I have never heard people who only eat chalav yisrael call OUD treif.

Please read the blog article that I linked to which explains this (has nothing to do with the pigs/horse milk issue, but rather with the problematic cow issue).

jelly belly

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 8:07 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

Barbara wrote:

OOTBubby wrote:

someoneoutthere wrote:

I'm curious if OOTBubby can share how this issue is dealt with, aside from the obvious separating of the animals. Do they rely on bittul?

If the milk from problematic cows is considered treif, how can it knowingly be sold to companies that will mark it as kosher? It seems there is no bittul here, which is what I assume the large plants rely on.

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 8:10 pm

jelly belly wrote:

They are not selling it to companies who market it as kosher. They are selling it to their own customers (who live in rural areas where Jews on the whole don't live) and it is not sold as kosher at all.

OOTBubby

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 8:21 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

Here's a link to the video of the discussion with the Nirbatur Rav and Rav Belsky. Some of the comments on the page a worth noting as well.

Please note that I have not personally watched the video; I have repeated what I was told was discussed.

Cholov Akum Nowadays

I just listened to this whole video (it is a little over an hour) because I realized that I shouldn't be stating what was said if I didn't have first hand knowledge.

Rav Belsky does not at all address the issue cited by the Nirbatur Rav of the problem of "cholov treife".

Rav Belsky does say (referring to consumers) we are not telling them that cholov stam is muttar. He goes on to say that we (the OU) must provide a hashgocha for people who eat cholov akum (because they rely on the hetter from Rav Moshe or one of the other hetterim). He also says it is not their job (the OU) to run an educational campaign to tell people that they should use only cholov yisroel, but that would be appropriate for another educational organization to do (he mentioned such as Torah Umesorah).

jelly belly

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 8:38 pm

OOTBubby wrote:

jelly belly wrote:

Ah, got it. You originally said it wasn't marked as CY. I didn't realize it's not marked as kosher at all.

groisamomma

Thu, Mar 29 2012, 11:45 pm

elf123 wrote:

shalhevet wrote:

Rodent wrote:

Considering that the prohibition has been done once something is swallowed there is absolutely no benefit in vomiting up something you may have eaten that is not kasher.

On that basis alone I don't believe the Moshe Feinstein story (that's not to say that there aren't rabbis out there that don't seem to know that halacha which is pretty scary). And someone else who may think that it is an honourable action to do is mistaken also for the record.

I have no idea if the story is true or not. And you are right about an issur.

But for kashrus there is another consideration - that what we eat becomes part of us and affects our neshama. That's why we are careful that little children don't eat anything of questionable kashrus, even below the age of chinuch and even when they are so little that they don't understand and there is no halachic problem of, for example, letting them continue to play with an electronic toy which they took themselves.

Are you saying OU-D products are "of questionable kashrus?"

I am. I think what OOTbubby said here makes a lot of sense.