Shredding Light on Cheese: The 6-Hour Rule, the Status of Whey, and Living on the Factory Floor

Thousands of cheeses actually out there. Thousands, literally many thousands of them throughout the world. Other cheese factories, there are many like this. This more than any more common have a team of Mashgichim living there or located [music] near the factory. Are you serious? I mean, there There's somebody living there the entire year? And they brought me this cheese, cheese with [music] a very shiny cheese. And the gentleman, the head of the company came here and said, "Rabbi, you don't want to touch that cheese. That cheese is coated with lard. That cheese has lard on it." And that's exactly what I was talking about 2,000 years ago. So, you just finished eating a piece of exotic sharp cheddar cheese. Do you really have to wait hours before eating meat? Why does a block of kosher cheese cost so much more than the identical non-kosher block sitting right next to it on the supermarket shelf? The story behind kosher cheese is a world of complex halacha, modern technology, and a level of dedication you will not believe. Rabbi Gordimer, thank you very much for coming. My pleasure being here. You are the expert in OU and cheese. I I did a little research and preparation for this meeting about the different kinds of cheeses and how they're made. Mhm. And I made a decision that I'm just going to eat it and enjoy it and not worry about it >> [laughter] >> cuz it's so complicated. But for kashrus, for kashrus, I know you can't just do that. So, I think most people when they think about kosher cheese, they just assume that you make kosher milk, however you make it, and then you turn it into cheese. So, there's no separate halacha of cheese. It's really just manufacture of the turning of kosher kosher milk into cheese. Is that correct? Um not really. Um kosher cheese Cheese has its own set of halachas, its own halachic categorization. Uh there's halacha of gvinas akum that cheese that is not made with special hashgacha, hashgacha temidis, is prohibited. It's non-kosher. Even though it's made out Even though milk can be kosher and the ingredients can be kosher, that cheese is wholly non-kosher. Like just like wine. If wine which is made out of grapes, but it doesn't have the special stringencies in its hashgacha, it's totally non-kosher wine. Cheese is the same thing. And even if a person um consumes hallav stam milk, he still is only allowed to have gevinat Yisrael. There's no such thing as a person saying I drink regular milk, I'll eat I'll eat regular cheese without a hashgacha. No, no matter what, a person is only allowed to have gevinat Yisrael. Any cheese that's not gevinat Yisrael doesn't have special hashgacha, it's gevinat akum and it's prohibited for everybody. Oh, I see. So, there were extra concerns for cheese that are that don't apply to milk. What are those extra concerns that that required a whole separate area of halacha? Yes, sure. So, the Gemara in Avodah Zarah on the Mishnah I have test there, as well as the Gemara on Lamed Hey, discuss the gezeirah, the issur of gevinat akum. And many reasons are mentioned in the Gemara as to why Chazal made this gezeirah of gevinat akum. The reason of Shmuel brought in the Gemara on Lamed Hey Mem Aleph in Avodah Zarah, which is that um lest the cheese be made from or kevis neveilah rennet, which is the um enzyme needed to be added to milk to make cheese, that naturally comes from a calf stomach. And the concern is that that rennet might be coming and normally would be coming from a non-shechted calf and the neveilah calf. And if you use that for as an ingredient to make the cheese, the cheese is totally non-kosher. So, lest that type of rennet is used in the cheese, Chazal made a gezeirah, no cheese is kosher without a hashgacha to make that hashgacha make sure that the enzymes used in the cheese are kosher enzymes. The cheese is only kosher if it's made with special on-site hashgacha. Mashgiach will mashgiach for the cheese making. Either the mashgiach will, it's machlokes, either watch the rennet to make sure see the rennet reserve the rennet make sure it's kosher rennet being used for the cheese, or himself to put the mash to put the rennet into the cheese. There's one opinion that the mashgiach must put the rennet himself into the vat of cheese to make the vat of milk to make the cheese. Well, okay. So, in other words, so when you go to the stores and you see on the shelf kosher cheese and non-kosher cheese, and you see the kosher cheese is much more expensive. >> Right. There's a reason why it's much more expensive. Because there's more Yeah, the hashgacha it's like matzah versus crackers. They're both the same ingredients pretty much, but you know, your flat flat dough and water, so to say flat, you know, flour and water, but the matzah you're paying for the mashgichim, the koshering, the mashgichim. So, too in cheese, you're really paying for the full-time hashgacha required to make kosher cheese. I'll also mention one more thing. One of the reasons the Gemara brings for the gezeiras bishul akum is that machlokin beis Shammai uBeis Hillel that the cheese is glazed over with chazer shmaltz, with lard. And I remember a company came to the OU many years ago and they wanted hashgacha on their the cheese that they had certain cheeses that qualified for, you know, OU hashgacha. But they brought me they brought here like a box of their cheeses, all types of cheeses, kosher and non-kosher. They were making kosher under another hashgacha and non-kosher, whatever. And they brought me this cheese cheese with a very shiny cheese. And the gentleman, the head of the company came here and said, "Rabbi, you don't want to touch that cheese. That cheese is coated with lard. That cheese has lard on it." And that's exactly what I was talking about 2,000 years ago, coating a cheese, glossing over with lard. And that's sold in America, too. Wow. I I imagine that not all the cheese factories are located next door to all the major Jewish communities. Definitely true, definitely, definitely. In fact, there are actually two types of kosher cheese operations, I would call it. Number one, it's sort of getting into what you're discussing is that due to the fact that cheese factories are located in very remote areas usually. And also the demand for kosher cheese versus the demand for non-kosher cheese across the country, across the world is is is, you know, numerically very small, relatively small. So, most factories will just will just have a team of mashgichim going there, one, two, three mashgichim going there for a short cheese kosher cheese campaign. They'll go out to somewhere in the far-flung areas of Midwest or wherever it's going to be located, maybe other parts of the world. They'll maybe kosher the plant if necessary and they'll be supervising the whole time the cheese production for a few days and that will be it. And they do this maybe once a month, maybe once every few months, it varies. Other cheese factories, there are many like this, there's more becoming more common, have a team of mashgichim living there or located near the factory. Very often there's a mashgiach house or mashgiach apartment. I deal with that myself in these certain areas cuz the company needs to have kosher cheese 24/7. And therefore, that's some they have this company's entirely a kosher cheese factory. This is not most cases, but it's it's it does exist, it's becoming more common. Are you serious? I mean, there there's somebody living there the entire year? Not somebody, yeah, several a team of people actually. There's a rotation, but they're always in these factories, we always make sure that there are two people always there. One person is usually resting or doing whatever he's doing, and the other person will be be doing the hashgacha, supervising the cheese, mashgiach tamidis, and they will take turns with their shifts. Then, the once they leave before they leave, others will relieve them, and they have a whole mashgiach set up there. They're living They're living there. They're there even during even Yom Tov, they have a sukkah there. They bring so- a shofar there for da- everything. They're living there year-round. I can't believe it. So, so and these factories, they're producing 9:00 to 5:00? They're producing More than that. They're producing producing um not 9:00 to 5:00, but um 24/7, midnight to midnight, basically. >> Wow. So, you have these mashgichim living in remote locations. I mean, each remote location has its own unique set of challenges. What are some challenges that they face? I mean, the mashgichim traveling on the road, for them it's it's everything in terms of, you know, kosher food, in terms of davening times, ev- every everything you can imagine these mashgichim are are dealing with. They follow the halacha 100% Mashgichim, a lot of them are big talmidei chachamim, and they're each one is a gadol hador in to himself. When I first came to the OU, within the first few years I was here, we were certifying a company in Denmark. And I went to go to I had to go to a I could visit there. Um just a review visit. And we were going to four plants, and one of them was in northern Denmark. And this was in June. This is like the height of the summer season, so to say, in terms of the zmanim. The shortest day, you know, is June I say the longest day of the calendar June 21st and this was close to that. So I got there and I wanted to I was exhausted and wanted to there was a hotel wanted to have a myra of and try to get a normal amount of sleep to catch up from the overseas flight. Be well rested for the next day and I checked this is before my zmanim existed this is decades ago. There's no [laughter] so I had there's an old fashioned alarm clock with me and shacharit was I think like 11:30 p.m. or something so I stayed I couldn't I couldn't stay dressed and everything like that until you know till 11:30. I saw that alos hashachar so I actually nitz hachama was like maybe 3:00 in the morning or something like that. So I I had to basically go to sleep maybe at 12:00 something you know I think I slept like 2 hours or so that was a that was a very tiring trip. Not recommended. >> [laughter] >> I had to do it but How is cheese made? Okay, there are basically two categories of cheese. The cheese we're probably in we're interested in this session is rennet set cheese we call hard cheese I guess in a non-technical way. And that cheese is made by adding culture which is a type of bacteria basically or acid to a vat of milk and then the rennet the enzyme rennet that rennet enzyme is added to the milk and that milk forms it curdles the milk and it forms little gelatinous pellets basically of cheese curd and those cheese curds and they expel the excess liquid in the in the vat. That gets expelled and the curd is molded and formed and aged and that's rennet set or hard cheese. What are names of hard cheeses? >> Yeah, sure. Cheddar, provolone, mozzarella, munster, swiss, parmesan, romano. Got it. There are thousands of cheeses actually out there. Thousands? Literally many thousands throughout the world. Okay. And all of them are all of them are available in kosher or not? No, no, not at all. Not at all. The kosher ones are the ones that are most popular basically among the populations that are you know the kosher populations throughout the world. The most specialized cheeses are rarely available kosher. Wow. So those sound like very sophisticated things. What did they do back in the day you know, before modern technology? Yeah, sure. So, back in the day, so just going back to the two types of cheeses, the more, I guess, primitive type of cheese, acid set, soft cheese, that you can just make literally as you started in the beginning, you can just leave I mean, you have to make sure it's on safety and so forth. The milk looked naturally some putting in milk bacteria, and there's also lactose, which is sugar that's in the milk. Okay. The bacteria in the milk will convert the lactose, if you leave it out, into lactic acid. Lactic acid will turn the milk into like a cottage cheese, like a primitive type of cottage cheese. And that in the old days, that was one way to do it. The other way was to take the rennet, which is today most rennet, at least in America, most is synthetic rennet, microbial rennet. But in the old days, they would take rennet very often the way it's naturally grown. It grows inside the fourth stomach, the abomasum, the cavea of the calf. Wow. And that rennet enzyme would added to milk, to have added milk or to a pot of milk in your kitchen, whatever it's going to be in your counter, and that would make cheese. Wow. How did they figure that out? Like, someone was carrying a fourth stomach and like, oops, dropped it into the pot of milk and hey, cheese. In the cheese, literature, I guess I would say there's a there's a legend that's brought, we have no proof it's true, that some nomad was traveling and he wanted to preserve his milk somehow, and either the milk just just saw that it turned into just let it out left it out and it turned into like a acid set type of cottage cheese product, or somehow, I don't know, he did something to it, he added this, I don't know where he would have known about it, added calf rennet to it, and it converted into cheese. Okay, I want to I want to take a moment just to to talk about you for a second. I read that you have a law degree and were practicing law Yes, that's right. >> before you Yeah. joined the OU. You told me that? Yeah, I went to as a I guess a pronounced a backup, so to say, I went to law school, I took the bar, I'm a member of the bar, and I was working in law um you know, a short time before I came to the OU, but I always wanted to work in star kashrut and after a short stint in kashrut, I realized kashrut is cuz for me. but to speak but abundance is not for me either. So, I wanted I was hoping something in star receiver would, you know, somehow come up for me. Um, in the meantime I was, you know, for practical purposes, you know, I pursued law as a career and um, I got a call from Rabbi Ganeck that the OU had an opening and Baruch Hashem came here for ooh, three interviews, um, your day beginning and a I guess a writing skills or a, you know, English English beginning English exam and Baruch Hashem it worked out and I've been here for 29 years. But did you initially start with cheese or you started other things? >> with dairy. I still do all all types of dairy, not just cheese. I do butter, ice cream, milk powder, all anything dairy, casein, which is milk protein, anything. And I was just I was just assigned um, the a dairy portfolio from the day I got here. And with the OU rabbinic coordinators such as myself, we're expected to have an expertise in our fields. It's not just enough to know that the, you know, it's not just paperwork, making sure the ingredients are kosher, the equipment is kosher, the labels have the proper symbol. We have to actually know, we have to have certain expertise in the production and the um, and therefore I had to really study up hard both by visiting cheese plants, dairy plants of all types really, as well as as doing a lot of reading in scientific literature, you know, dairy literature to really get whatever knowledge I have in in dairy and especially in cheese. And um, not only that, but cheese, I guess a lot of foods are this way, but cheese really is not just the cheese conscious isn't only the cheese itself because there are byproducts of cheese. For instance, you make cheese, you make whey. As I said, 90% of the cheese vat turns into whey. And where there's whey protein, when you there's cheese also has a, I guess I I call it a sibling called casein, which is milk protein without the fat. We can talk that's a separate thing, but casein is very much related to cheese. And the casein comes out is also separated when you make cheese? Casein actually is what cheese is. The word casein is the is the white protein in milk. It's the main protein in milk and what happens when you make cheese is that the casein um, particles called micelles, they actually are agglomerated together. They're made into a they clump together into a curd, into a into a piece of cheese, I would say, a heft of cheese. That's what it is. And the word cheese actually The word in German is casein. You get this kez from casing. Casing is the building block of cheese, that what cheese basically is. Cheese with is the matrix of casein and fat entrapped in it. I mean, that's the main thing. But casein now, if say you have casein or caseinate, which is a soluble casein, that's just pure casein protein without any fat in there, without all the other things that are included in cheese. But um nevertheless, casein In order to understand casein, then we certify a lot of casein companies one has to develop the expertise or a a certain working knowledge of casein as well. So, if you get into cheese, you have to know about cheese, you have to learn about whey, you have to learn about casein. You have to have a working knowledge of all these types of foods. Um whey cream is a cream that can be made from whey. There's whey cream butter. This is a whole network of foods that you have to um have a like sort of a master, I don't know, a certain expertise of in in cheese to understand how these other foods are made. And in terms of halacha, our we call them cheese, but I'm from Montreal. I know that in Montreal there's you know, a lot of European influence. Sure. And so, I know that the French tend to make fun of the things that we call cheese. Not everything that we call cheese is really a cheese. So, in terms of the halacha and categorizing things that are cheese, what is actually cheese in halacha and what's not cheese? >> Okay. That's a big machlokes. So, rennet-set cheese, cheese that either has rennet, real calf rennet in it, or cheese And we'll get to that maybe if you want later on how you can do that. But cheese that has the an enzyme in it, a rennet type of enzyme to make the cheese, that's definitely gevina. That has the halachos of cheese, which hopefully we'll get into. That's cheese. So, mozzarella, cheddar, all those things >> are all subject to the strict halachic stringencies of cheese. However, acid-set cheese is a machlokes. Rav Moshe Feinstein says as a safek himself whether or not acid-set cheese requires a mashgiach to be there. Is it gevina d'akum or is it We can get into this all, but is that halachically cheese is a question. There are different opinions about that. But rennet-set cheese definitely cheese, whether the rennet is is um synthetic rennet or whether it's coming from a calf, whatever. It's And it is cheese. Okay, so you mentioned that there are some factories that are specifically for kosher cheese. Mhm. And you said there are other factories that produce non-kosher cheese and kosher cheese. And Right. Like like we discussed in the beginning, uh cheese factories are not just a bunch of tables with cheese rotting on them or >> Not at all. So, they've got they've got pipes, vats. How How is the What does it look like in a simplistic sense? Okay, sure. So, I'll just go through the basics. So, milk comes in these large tanker trucks. The milk's unloaded, raw milk comes from large comes from farms. Very often And those trucks need to be kosher themselves? Those tankers? So, those trucks normally are dedicated either kosher or more more likely not they're dedicated only for milk, for raw milk. That's all they're dedicated for. It's all they haul. And they're they're very very thoroughly CIP, cleaned in place. They're sanitized very thoroughly between each load. And these trucks come from the farms. They are on truck might go to a half a dozen or a dozen farms on the way picking up milk from this farm, that farm till they're till the truck is full. This tanker's And they just add all the milk together? Um yeah, it goes into the bay, into the back part of the truck, yeah. And there are ways to do it that doesn't, you know, spill and so forth. It's neat. Um it drops it delivers unloads at the bay, at the unloading area of the cheese factory, the cheese plant. Could that mixing all that milk together doesn't change the flavor of the milk or nobody cares about that? >> It doesn't won't make it It looks It's fresh milk. It's fresh milk. It's kept in silos. It's going to be pasteurized. It's going to be used pretty quickly. It's not going to It's not going to have any any um taste issues with it. Okay. And the main taste in cheese we can get to is in is created by the culture and the rennet and the temperature. Okay. Either way, the milk um tanker delivers the milk. The milk's unloaded and it just it goes into silos, large holding tanks at the cheese plant. Wow. Then there are vats, so large vats. These are called double O vats. Double O means it's a circular vat with a heating coil around it. So, you have like an O with an O around it. The milk is pumped into these vats. And um each vat is a is an enormous vat. You have to use a The old-fashioned vats, you have to use a ladder to climb up. Do you want to look into the vat? You have to use a a small ladder to climb up to the top to to peer in. Yeah. And the milk is goes into the vats. And then, after that, um there will be um culture, which is I'm going to be the acid and bacterial culture added into the milk. And then, the rennet is added. And rennet is very, very potent. A minuscule amount of rennet, a tiny amount of rennet is all that's needed to set That's the word set, which means to coagulate an entire vat of cheese with tens of thousands of pounds of milk it can be. Wow. Tens of thousands of pounds of milk. So, um that's that And then, what will happen afterwards is that within a short amount of time, the milk will curdle, and you'll see little pellets little pellets forming. Little gelatinous pieces forming in the milk. And you'll also see a lot of excess liquid, which is whey. Whey, actually, when you make a vat of cheese, 90% of that milk is whey. It's It's the leftover liquid. 10% becomes cheese curd. And that curd will be stirred. The curd will be It'll be formed like a gel that will be cut. After a while, there's more stuff going on. It'll be molded into molded into whatever shape. It'll be The whey will be separated away. And then, the cheese can either be aged. If it's a Italian-type of cheese like a mozzarella or a provolone cheese, you have another process. Very fascinating. It's called the um pasta filata process. Now, what they do in order to make Italian cheeses have an elastic texture. These cheeses, after they're made in the vat and mold their molds are formed, they're then put into a cooker, a special thing special cooker at about 160 170 75° of hot water. And the cheese will sit in this hot water. And there are augers. There are these prongs that pull and stretch and push this curd this this mozzarella curd let's say a provolone curd in the hot water. And that curd will be endowed with an elastic texture, which is ideal for melting melting into pizza and into something like that. That's really how it's done. And after the cheese is aged whatever duration it's supposed to be for the specs of the cheese, the cheese will be um cut into smaller pieces very often. It'll be packaged. You have mashgichim throughout the entire process for everything. They'll with the cheese, for instance, if it's being aged, mashgichim will have to have the cheese sealed with kosher seal before the aging. They'll have to come back when the aging is finished. Sometimes the aging involves moving the cheese around, flipping it over, let's say, in between the aging every every week or two where the cheese is being aged. You need a mashgiach there every time to come to unseal the cheese, to reseal. It's a big process, a big hashgacha process. And mashgichim, of course, are there at the end for the cutting, for the for the the packaging, as well as for any koshering. If you have a cooker, the cooker has to be kosher for mozzarella. If you have a brine tank, the brine has to be replenished with kosher brine. It's a It's very, very involved. >> So, you mentioned that according to some opinions, that the mashgiach has to be the one to actually pour the rennet into the cheese. Does that mean that the tzaddikim that are in the cheese factories are climbing up ladders and pouring rennet into these enormous vats of milk? Yeah, in traditional cheese plants, that's how it's done, actually. The mashgiach will take a pail of rennet. It'll be actually half rennet, half water. Mashgiach will first check to make sure the rennet is coming from a sealed container of rennet with the proper hashgacha on it. And then the mashgiach will take this pail of rennet, this bucket of rennet, and climb up the little ladder to the double vat, and they'll pour the rennet into the vat, and they'll observe the rennet going into the milk. That's how they do it. There are modernized cheese plants in which there's no human involvement in in this in this manner, in this really hands-on manner. There are other ways to certify the cheese. That's a whole other discussion, but nevertheless, there are I'd say maybe the majority of cheese plants still operate as you described. And that way they fulfill the sheet of the shach. The shach is the acharon. This is really based upon you know, upon rishonim, actually. They say the mashgiach must actually physically pour the rennet. There's only going to quote the shach by the way that says that compares according to his girsa he had compares gevina to pas and to bishul. Just like pas akum, bishul akum, you avoid it by having the mashgiach turn on the flame or bake the bread or turn on the fire and grill the meat. So, too the mashgiach pours in the milk. He has to have a nasi. A nasi is necessary. Wow. So, the mashgiach is involved in the actual making of the cheese. And is that once a day? How how often is that? So, it's really throughout the day. Um every 30 30 to 45 minutes, depending on the plant, they'll have another vat of cheese made. And these plants will start usually early in the morning and they'll go Sometimes they start even at midnight or 2:00 in the morning and they'll go for a long time. They make 10, 15, maybe 20 vats of cheese every 30 to 40 minutes or so, whatever it's going to be. The mashgiach is there the entire time for every single vat being made. The companies then will go down for a certain amount of time, maybe an hour or two, whatever, to totally clean the system, to sterilize the system, and they'll start up again. It's really almost around the clock. Some Some companies, of course, are smaller companies. They might just operate have one or two shifts. Some go literally throughout the night. They have maybe two or three hours off during the entire 24 hours and the mashgiach is there the entirety of the time. Wow. And so, you said that a lot of plants have both kosher runs and non-kosher So, does that mean you have to kosher all of these enormous vats? Great question. Well, here here's the easy part of this, so to say. Um most cheese, not all most cheese is made below yad soledet, below the temperature at which non-kosher tum could be transferred into something. Most cheeses are made, like say um mozzarella is made at 104, cheddar is made at a upper 90s. They're not yad yad soledet. Let's assume 120. Let's assume yad soledet. But none of them even come to yad soledet of the 100 or 110, that is even sheet like that. None of them even come close to that. Most cheeses don't come close to that. So, there's very little kosher. There are cheeses though that are made at hot temperatures. And yes, in that case, the mashgiach will kosher the vat. They'll boil out the vat. It's a very involved process. It's a long process. It uses a lot of water. It has a lot of you know, a lot of power to heat everything up, heat the coils. But they will actually do that. It's rare though, but it does it's sometimes it needed and the the mashgiach will do it. You start with milk. And milk has all these different components. As you mentioned, there's casein, there's whey, there's you know, in the process of cheese, they separate. Is there any component of milk that isn't actually considered dairy when you isolate it? Um there's all the whey itself. The whole tree shown in whether or not whey is whole of the rabbinical deraisa. That's a machlokes. Is whey a new product in the market or you being used in a new way or it's as old as cheese? It's as old as cheese. In fact, um the Rush when he talks about how um his own opinion argues in Tosfos in terms of the status of whey derabonan deraisa in terms of mechalav, he um discusses how whey or how whey protein and whey pre-made were made in his days. So it's it's it goes back a long way. As I mentioned in the Gemara, Rashi mentions >> time that he had it. Yeah, as it's mentioned in the Gemara, the Gemara talks about it. You have from being mechalav whey mechalav is whey. So that's how it goes back you know, it's from the time of Whey really is is when you take when you make cheese I said cheese really is made out of casein and fat. The other parts of milk that didn't turn in succeed in becoming cheese, that's whey. Whey is really the residual liquid of the milk that didn't succeed in becoming cheese. And just one more thing, based upon that, fascinating halacha, even though cheese has the halacha of gvinas akum, you have to have a mashgiach there the entire cheese making process, not you have to have a like cholav say cholav Yisrael. You have to have a mashgiach there good enough. >> Some of the all the time, yeah. Yeah, cheese the whole time. However, whey does not require mashgiach temidi cuz whey is the part of milk that never became cheese. And therefore, whey, as long as the ingredients are kosher, the equipment is kosher, and that's a complicated thing on its own. But whey actually I mean it's created when the cheese is being made. So there's a mashgiach there already when it's being made. But you're saying once you separate it and then start dealing with it itself, then you don't need the mashgiach temidi. >> Even even more than that, even more than that, there are plants that make non-kosher cheese and these plants the whey is going to be kosher. We certify their whey. There's no need for a mashgiach there as long as the ingredients are kosher and as long as the equipment is kosher. It's a complicated system to I'm about. I'm just giving Rashi prokim the just simplifying it. As long as the ingredients and equipment are kosher, the whey will be kosher with any mashgiach stepping foot in the plant. Like a mozzarella, for instance, very often we use vinegar to adjust the pH. So, the vinegar being used in a in a plant that we're certifying the whey, even though the cheese is giving us a but the whey that exudes is is you know, the remains behind, so to say, is kosher. But that vinegar isn't kosher, that's a problem. A consumer consumer should never think, "Oh, it's just whey, it's not a big deal. It's just it's just like like milk. It's not at all like milk." Whey comes from cheesemaking, as we said. And even though the whey is not subject to a giving us a but the cheese can impact upon the whey in the following manner. I won't say the following way, but the following manner. That if you have a vat of cheese and it's a high temperature vat, for instance, then the bleah, the flavor of the taste of that cheese will be absorbed that cheese into the whey. That whey is non-kosher. And even more important and more common than that, 1/3 of the cheese made in America is mozzarella cheese. All the pizza companies, pizza chains, and so forth. And um mozzarella cheese, as I said, it goes to a cooker. Now, the cooker, it's a I said a bath of hot water and you add to it a temperature very high temperatures. That water that mozzarella's cooked in is compatible with whey and many cheese companies, non-kosher cheese companies, will take this cooker water and they'll funnel it into their whey. They'll pipe it into their whey cuz the water's going to go to waste and there's a lot of fat in it, a lot of salt and a lot of other stuff from the cheese absorption. And it's compatible with whey, so why not put it into the whey? Once you do that, the whey is non-kosher. So, to certify a a whey plant, we have to make sure the ingredients are kosher, make sure that that is not a hot temperature vat, and make sure if there's any mozzarella being made there or similar cooked cheeses, make sure there's a hard pipe drain to the ground from that cooker water. That cooker water cannot go into the whey. And sometimes it's very challenging, but that's how you certify whey. Wow. I heard you say that you find the science of milk and cheese um inspiring. Yeah, it actually is. It is. Yeah, I'll tell you why. Yeah, cuz you see by the structure of the universe this way, but you see by the structure of milk that you see the purposeful planning, the purposeful divine planning in milk. I'll give you two quick examples if you don't mind. Number one, I mentioned that the main protein in milk is casein and that's what makes milk makes milk white. Whey protein is present, it's a tiny minuscule protein. It's It's the minority protein. The main dominant protein is whey casein protein. The casein casein protein most most of not only human most of animal life, most life really is from mother's milk, from milk. Mother's milk as well as in youth people drinking milk and so forth most people throughout their their lives drinking milk. That's the most inexpensive natural way to get protein. It so happens not happens but it's divinely created like everything in the world. The casein particles called casein micelles, the little particles, they're evenly dispersed within milk. Anytime you have milk, you'll never find the casein all stuck at the bottom or agglomerated toward the bottom or the side of the side of the glass, the bottom of the container. It's evenly dispersed. Why is that? Cuz God endowed casein particles, casein micelles with a negative electric charge and every casein particle repels the other one. So they're constantly constantly in suspension, evenly spread throughout the milk. Not only that, but casein every casein particle has it's called kappa casein has like a furry type of cover microscopic on the casein so they can't stick together unless you make them into cheese. And therefore, no matter what, milk will always have an even dispersion of casein for nutrition purposes. And not only that, but I'm saying I'm in the in the animal world, the animals um cows, goats, sheep and so forth, these animals they drink their mother's milk, their forestomach is lined with rennet. When the animals drink their mother's milk, that milk will go through their stomach, it'll become the equivalent of cheese, a very supercharged protein in their forestomach and it'll totally nourish the animal and grow its grow its muscles. The animals' lives depend upon this and set it up. It's just an amazing mechanism. So it's just very inspiring. So, everybody knows about waiting after meat before eating milk. But, a lot of people don't realize that there are halachas about eating meat after milk. And one is just eating regular any dairy product. One of them is hard cheeses. Can you just explain that? And which which cheeses it applies to? >> Yeah, sure. Just going back to the first part of what you asked, actually. Um before a person has meat after having milk, person has to thoroughly wash their hands and cleanse their mouth, both with a liquid, whether it may be drinking water or something like that, or mouthwash, as well as either brushing their teeth thoroughly or eating a parve food that's going to clean the mouth out. But, anytime a person can't just have um have um some milk and then have a you know, hamburger a minute later. He has to first, you know, clean his hands, clean his mouth. And some say have to wait a certain minimum amount of time. But, in terms of the cheese, the hard cheese, that's where everything that's the curiosity is um is People always ask me about the Parmesan shakers at the pizza stores. Yeah, sure. So, we'll get into that. So, so so to discuss this, we have to really go back to why a person a person has to wait after meat before having milk. There's a machlokes we shown them on this topic. It's all in the Shulchan Aruch. The Rosh in the Shulchan Aruch says that there's mashicha's ta'am, there's an aftertaste, fatty aftertaste from some munis, from the fat of the meat in the person's mouth that's going to linger there for a while. And therefore, before a person has milk, he has to wait for this mashicha this ta'am, this mashicha's ta'am, this enduring taste to dissipate. And the different minhagim, 6 hours most people wait, 3 hours, 1 hour, whatever a person is ethnic minhag it is a person has to wait. That's one reason to wait after meat before milk. The other reason that the reason the Rambam brings, basar bein hashinayim, there's meat in the mouth that doesn't dislodge easily. It takes time to dislodge. Person has to wait whatever amount of time it is for the so the meat to dislodge. Different minhagim as we mentioned, 6, 3, 1 hour, whatever. And that's the other reason, basar bein hashinayim. These same two reasons actually pertain to having certain types of cheese prior to meat. Certain types of cheese the the person you mentioned this, certain types of cheese have a mashichas tam. A member of Belsky's household one told one time told me that his father took the Lower East Side of Manhattan and they had the old open cheese market kosher market there. And um he said that his father they had they had Limburger cheese there. And Belsky said it's the most stinky cheese. It's the most stinky cheese. There's no kosher version to say. It's a very very pungent cheese. Limburger has a mashichas tam, a very very pungent taste that will let stand in the mouth for a while. Person can't have Limburger kosher version of course and then have a beef afterwards. A person has to person has to wait cuz mashichas tam. Similar to mashichas tam that Rashi discusses about basar b'chalav, basar before milk, placed before milk. And so too certain cheeses, this is much more common, have like is just like basar b'nei Yisrael, they have their very brittle cheeses and similar to meat, they're not going to leave the mouth right away because there's just a lot of um there's going to be residue whatever the brittle cheese is stuck in the stuck in the teeth. And these types of cheeses person has to wait before having meat. Examples of these cheese are for instance um aged cheddar um aged cheddar cheddar can be aged anywhere between um 6 months to many years. Kosher cheddar more than 2 years you're not going to find. But there is cheddar cheese, let's look at the package. Regular regular non-descript or mild cheddar means it's aged less than 6 months. But 6 months is around it's not formal g'zeira sh'ya, but it's a approximation that R'Belsky told me. 6 months is an approximation. Cheese that's been aged 6 months it becomes the whey comes it dehydrates whatever residual moisture is there the whey moisture trapped in the cheese goes out evaporates or so to say. And these cheeses are brittle, they're very very dry and they stick in the mouth. So for instance cheddar cheese um you know aged cheddar um certain types of old Parmesan regular Parmesan actually by the way is aged 10 months by law. Regular Parmesan by law. You asked beforehand about the Parmesan from the shakers I believe. Um the shaken Parmesan I asked R'Belsky by that actually. Parmesan which is natural Parmesan that's been grated or shredded but it's little tiny pieces, R'Belsky said you have to wait same amount as regular Parmesan. And that amount can be your feeling is better if you're if you're yucking with 3 hours, you only wait 3 hours after she after these cheeses as well. You don't have to wait 6 like like the Eastern Europeans do. Either way, that's what our kosher says. But for that you have those types of Parmesan you have to wait. However, there is cheese which is cheese powder. It's like particles, but it's not actually natural cheese. It's cheese that's been made the chunks of cheese that have been melted down, mixed with the majority of water and other additives, and then they're um then into a big liquid and they're spray dried into a powder. And this type of powder that's used today for cheese flavor snacks, that's what the kosher says if you have to wait at all. Besides those will say Parmesan, those will say >> They can be any flavor. They can be Parmesan, cheddar, a lot of cheddars cheddar like it might say made from aged Parmesan, aged cheddar, whatever it is. Parmesan's always aged. But um these types of snacks the kosher says this whole thing is a is a minute a minute we were but it's a minute it's not a it's not a from so like we're supposed to say you know we don't have to we don't have to do find find or you know assume for this type of thing. So for that the kosher says there's no need to wait. So if a person has a snack and has a cheddar seasoning in it which is a spray dried cheddar let's say not a piece of cheddar cheese but just spray dried particles of cheddar which is mostly mostly water. In that case the kosher you do not have to wait after that. Can I ask you a personal question? Please go ahead. >> Are you sick of cheese? Uh no no. I don't I I don't I eat very few pizza pizza's my favorite food. So pizza I can't get I can't get tired of too much. >> This job was right for you. >> Yeah yeah >> [laughter] >> it was right for me. But other cheeses I I eat I eat cheddar I eat cheddar cheese. Other than that I don't really not really into into cheese so much other than that. I mean it's fascinating to learn about it and to deal with it and there's so much variety and there's so much complication in an amazing way kosher and science science but not really in terms [snorts] of it's a cheese consumer you know except for pizza I'm not a not one of the big ones. Wow this has been enlightening. Thank you very very much. >> My pleasure. >> For joining us. My My Thank you. Thank you for tuning in to Keeping It Kosher. If you enjoyed this episode, please rate, review, and subscribe. We'll see you next month as we continue to uncover the stories behind the symbol.