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re: Rich54
BS"D
Western bagels is kosher when purchased straight out of the bakery at the Sepulveda location. Lousy bagels, in my opinion, but people here in Valley Village seem to use them whenever they need bagels. I was once thinking of starting a bagelry because I didn't like the kosher certified bagels in the Valley. But after seeing the way people use a decidedly inferior product, I figured what's the use of making a better bagel if people can't discern the difference, or are perfectly happy with poor quality? We go in to the Bagel Factory on Robertson for, in our opinion, the best tasting bagels in LA (although La Brea Bagels has a few good varieties, but tent do be sweeter), since my wife works near there.
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Pardon my ignorance, but I'm curious. What's the difference between a kosher bagel and any bagel from a bakery - where they don't also make pork or shellfish dishes or mix dairy and meat? Why, for instance, wouldn't the bagels at Brooklyn Bagel Factory on Beverly be kosher? Or any of the bagel places in the Valley? Maybe they are.
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re: estone888
I am not an expert, but to be kosher it must be certified by a rabbi with the authority to do so. If a person only consumes kosher foods than they must come from a kosher shop. I'm sure that Jerome and others could give a much better and more detailed answer but that should be on a different board!
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re: sel
weinstein5
Mar 23, 2007 03:25 AM
You are pretty much on target - the either a local kosher certification organization (CRC, Star-K), National Organization (OU, OK) or local a Rabbi oversees the bakeries producstion and insure the ngredients used are kosher - and no non-kosher ingredients are used -
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re: sel
There are lots of factors that make something kosher or not kosher. In a bagel factory like most western bagels where they serve non-kosher meats there's an immediate issue. Even if they only served cheeses, those cheeses are not usually kosher so you have a mixing of something that is kosher and something that is not. Things don't typically have to be supervised by a rabbi per se but there is someone called a "mashgiach" who does the kosher supervision to make sure that there's no funny business going on.
There's a lot of food products that go into making bagels that need kosher certification that you wouldn't normally think of - like seasonings for different flavored bagels - not all garlic powders are kosher. Some seasonings use animal by products that make them totally kosher. Just as an example of something you wouldn't expect - they use certain bugs in certain powders just to give it a vivid red color. (Bugs are even worse than pigs and shellfish when it comes to kosher).
Also - very important when it comes to baking - if you're making any kind of bread product, even cupcakes and you're using more than 14 cups I believe you have to separate a portion of the dough as "challah" which I'm sure a non-kosher place does not do.
Most people think of challah as the braided bread we eat on the sabbath which is incorrect. We call that challah as short hand but really challah is a portion of the dough we used to separate when we were cooking to make for the priestly cohens who served in the temple in Israel. Although we no longer have the temple, we still keep this practice because one day, with G-d's help, we will once again have the temple and this custom will be remembered because we've kept it going for thousands of years.
Additionally, there is a special Hebrew prayer that is recited during the separation of challah that must be said by a Jew in order for it to count.
There are many more issues but I thought I'd just point out a few things. Kosher is not a simple matter...unfortunately. There are many many things that people mistake as kosher. If you're really interested I would recommend going to the OU website (ou.org) or reading some of the articles at the RCC (rccvaad.org).
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