Assessing Kashrut Organizations
So here’s a question for TeamKosher –
You find something in the store that you think would be nice to add to your favorite recipe, but don’t so much recognize the hechsher on the package. How do you go about assessing the acceptability of the hashgacha (outside of asking your rabbi)? What questions would you ask if you were able to talk with the people in charge? With the increasing diversity in kashrut certification organizations, this is perhaps becoming more and more of a concern.
I’ll start the discussion by saying that my personal policy is that, in favor of community, I consider all hechshers (excepting the plain “K” unless I know about that particular item) acceptable until I have good reason not to. Of course then the question becomes what constitutes good reason not to. Thus, the question of how to find out more and what questions to ask. What do you think?
The Chicago Rabbinical Council has an interesting article entitled "Understanding the Reliability of Kosher Agencies," available at http://www.crcweb.org/Artic...It doesn’t get into the gory halachic details about kashrut certification, but it gives some good background as to what might might certain organizations "unacceptable" or "unreliable."
Well, I found a OV label the other day and thought…what the?….I have never heard of this. Does this even exist or is some kind of weird "trick." It was on a box of plain instant mashed potatoes. Anyone else ever seen this?
"OV" is the symbol of the Vaad Hoeir of Saint Louis: http://www.ovkosher.org/def...
I keep a card in my wallet that summarizes many of the hecksherim that our Vaad "accepts". This list mostly comes from the Rabbi Eidlitz website. See: http://www.kosherquest.org/... for a list and a discussion.