by Rabbi Chaim Cohn

In truth, our caution is justified. Just as one cannot necessarily judge a book by its cover, it is often impossible to ascertain a product’s kosher status by reading the ingredient statement.

Having supervised the kashrus of flavors and chemicals for seven years, I can report that the need for good supervision has never been more acute. The evolution of the flavors industry over the past several decades has been rapid and complex, and the legalities of product labeling are intricate. The result is that an ingredient statement can stymie even a kashrus professional, let alone a layperson.

Label Legalities

What information must a food company disclose in an ingredient statement?

First, let us dispense with the myth that companies are allowed a “fudge factor” of two percent — that is, that ingredients comprising less than two percent need not be listed on an ingredient statement. The law requires the listing of all ingredients, in whatever proportion they are present, with two exceptions: ingredients that are classified as an “incidental additive” or as a “processing aid.”

Incidental additives are items present in insignificant amounts that do not serve a technical or functional effect in the food. An example is the soap used to wash the equipment. It is possible (although undesirable) that a minute amount of soap will be present in a product made on that equipment, but the soap is incidental to the product.

A processing aid is present during production but is not present in the final product. Alternatively, it is converted into a constituent that is anyway present in the product. (For example, when hydrochloric acid is added to a base product, usually the chloride will dissipate, while the hydrogen joins with oxygen to form water, adding to any other water in the product.) Or the processing aid may remain at the final stage, but at an insignificant level and no longer serving any function.

Excepting these categories, all items added to a product must be included in the ingredient statement. As an example, labels will list a preservative, although generally these cannot legally constitute more than one-half percent of a product. Preservatives are neither incidental nor used for processing; they are essential to the product, and therefore must be listed among the ingredients, irrespective of their volume.

Now, whereas all significant ingredients must be listed, why can’t we rely on a product label? First, we should note that an ingredient statement is permitted by law to be vague. For example, a label can state that the product contains “natural flavors,” without specifying the actual flavors. We have no way of knowing whether these flavors are of vegetable or animal origin.

Yet even if the listed ingredients seemingly are kosher, there are three primary reasons that militate in favor of caution.

Equipment Problems

The first issue concerns utensils — the equipment on which a product is manufactured. A company may manufacture numerous items on the same equipment. The ingredient statement of a product will not disclose products that were previously made in the same utensils. But by Jewish law, a product’s kosher status can be compromised if non-kosher products were made on the equipment. Whether or not an item becomes not kosher in this manner is subject to the halachos that govern beli’os, the absorption by equipment of taste from items that are cooked or stored in it.

The temperature at which the prior item was made and the duration of its stay in the utensil must be considered. There is a halachic cooking temperature, termed yad soledes bo. If the item was heated above this temperature, its not kosher taste has been absorbed into the equipment. If the subsequent kosher run is also made above yad soledes bo, it absorbs the not kosher taste, rendering it not kosher as well.

Furthermore, the taste of a liquid that remains in a utensil for twenty-four hours is also absorbed into the utensil, even if no cooking took place. We term this kavush.

Interestingly, kosher professionals will attest that the people whose cooperation we need to determine issues of beli’ah think that we are foolish! Almost everywhere I have worked, at least one company employee has said to me: “Rabbi, I understand that in the old days there was a problem of absorption, but today’s equipment is stainless steel, and stainless steel does not absorb.” To this I respond that we must implement the halachah across the board, dealing with stainless steel in the same way that we deal with other metals.

I was once kashering a non-kosher stainless steel vat. After a thorough cleaning, the vat developed a thin layer of surface skim. At that moment, a plant engineer who had challenged me concerning stainless steel walked by. I called him over and showed him the layer of skim. He said: “Rabbi, I don’t understand why, but you have empirical evidence that stainless steel does absorb.” Six months later, he called me to say that he now understood how stainless steel absorbs. He said that during usage of the utensil, “microfissures develop in the metal. This is especially true if you heat it, due to the expansion and contraction of the metal.”

We must also confront the often-daunting task of cleaning the equipment thoroughly. On one occasion, I was asked to inspect a facility that produces rice cakes. The purpose of the inspection was to resolve whether a kosher-supervised company could contract to produce its rice cakes there. The inspection began benignly, and I thought it would conclude without a hitch. The rice was pressed into cakes which then were put on a conveyor belt for transport into an oven, which heated them for a few seconds.

The challenge came when I inspected the conveyor belt. Along the belt was an atomizer for spraying a flavor coating on the cake, including non-kosher flavors. Some of the flavoring sprayed onto the belt itself, and the belt, a tight mesh, was impossible to thoroughly clean. Short of disassembling the belt for cleaning — a sixteen-hour affair — I could not imagine a solution that would permit its use. In the end, the company wishing to utilize this facility booked two-week slots when only kosher production would take place.

A colleague encountered a similar issue. He was inspecting a facility to determine its suitability for pareve margarine production, and insisted that the conveyor belt be removed to look for dairy margarine residue. The company engineer insisted that their cleaning process left no dairy margarine unturned. Muttering the words “These crazy rabbis” under his breath, he finally removed the belt. To his chagrin, he found mounds of dairy margarine at each roller joint!

The second issue we confront is nullification, or bittul. Jewish law stipulates that non-kosher product is nullified in sixty parts of kosher product. As long as the product was not intentionally made for a Jew, we may consume the finished mixture.

However, to simply leave the principle at that is to improperly express it. The actual principle is founded on the assumption that at a ratio of sixty to one, the not kosher product cannot be tasted.

If, however, the not kosher ingredient impacts taste at a lesser proportion, the product is not kosher.

Manufacturers commonly use flavorings that impact products at a ratio of 200 or even 300 to one. Furthermore, the flavorings themselves may contain up to ninety percent carriers such as alcohol or propylene glycol; often only ten percent of the flavoring is actual flavor, so that the amount of flavor in the final product may be one in 2,000 or less. And the industry’s sophistication continues to grow.

A two-liter soft drink bottle contains approximately forty drops of flavoring, including the color additive. The rest is water, sweetener, and citric acid. Some flavor ingredients are so powerful that they have an impact at a ratio of parts per million. In our soft drink example, only four or five drops actually transmit flavor; the rest of the flavoring simply transports the flavor to the finished drink. Halachically, even a flavoring at this minute ratio is significant and is not battel. And again, a company is permitted to be vague about the flavors in its product, to protect its proprietary interest. Therefore, one cannot read an ingredient statement of a soda bottle to determine its kashrus.

The third issue concerns solidifiers and catalysts — ingredients that are ma’amid or mechametz. These do not impart taste, but are indispensable to the final product. They facilitate the production. A non-kosher ma’amid or mechametz renders the product forbidden. This is true even if the ma’amid or mechametz is not detectable in the final product. A ma’amid or mechametz is never nullified.

Rennet, used in cheese curdling, is the classic ma’amid. Traditional rennet comes from a cow’s stomach lining. The rennet is not detectable at the end of the cheese-making process; nonetheless, cheese made with non-kosher rennet is forbidden.

Yeast is the classic mechametz. The yeast acts as a catalyst or facilitator for the product, and if it was grown on a non-kosher culture, may present a kashrus problem.

Methianal, a chemical that is sometimes not kosher, may be used either as a solidifier or as a flavoring agent. Its two uses, along with the fact that it constitutes an infinitesimal portion of the final product, make it a complicated chemical to address from the kashrus perspective. In a case where methianal was used inadvertently for flavoring and is not detectable in the final product, we can permit the product. If, however, its purpose was to be a solidifier, a ma’amid, the product would be prohibited.

Given the above, it is evident that we cannot simply read an ingredient statement to determine a product’s kashrus. Fortunately, blessed as we are with myriad products bearing kosher supervision, we need not resort to reading labels.

Rabbi Chaim Cohn, a specialist in flavors, is a Rabbinic Coordinator at the OK Labs.

Myth: The kashrus of soda may depend on whether it is light or dark.

Fact: Dark sodas may contain grape skin extract, castorium (a beaver product), and cochineal (made from beetle wings). Light sodas may contain white grape concentrate or civit (made from cat).

Myth: Natural flavors are more likely to be problematic than artificial flavors, or vice versa.

Fact: I have specialized in kosher flavor production for seven years, and I cannot say which presents a greater issue. Both natural and artificial flavors may be derived from animals or their byproducts.

Myth: One-hundred percent pure vegetable oil means 100% pure vegetable oil.

Fact: While the starting oil may be 100% vegetable oil, the processing aids may contain animal products. There also may be residue from animal oils that were previously housed in the same tanks storing the vegetable oil.