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It's kosher when you eat Muller yogurt

By Howard B. Owens

Here's a little fact about Genesee County you may not know: Batavia's largest food processing plant is kosher.

Kosher, as in certified by a rabbi.

That means no animal -- except fish -- products are used in the plant's food production, as in no cow or pig parts to make gelatin.

A few days ago as I passed through the Tops check-out line with six containers of Frut Up (I really wish they would sell this in a six-pack container), the cashier said, "did you know there's tilapia in this?"

Heck, up to that point, I didn't even know what tilapia was. Some sort of fish, I recalled dimly.

When I got home, I read the label a little closer. Yup, tilapia is listed. So is "kosher gelatin."

If you know your history of Jell-O (and who doesn't in Genesee County), you know gelatin was originally made with from pork and pork skins, horses, and cattle bones or cattle hides. 

Those are all animals that in a kosher kitchen can't mix, even a single molecule.

As it turns out, you can also make gelatin from tilapia, and since observant Jews can mix fish and dairy, if you want fruity gelatin with your yogurt, and you want it to be kosher, you need tilapia to do it.

Rabbi Doctor David Sheinkopf inspected the Muller Quaker plant in Batavia and as a result, the yogurt products Frut Up and Corner can be sold as "Certified Kosher," according to Scott Gilmore, spokesman for PepsiCo.

"Taste is important and we use the best ingredients," Gilmore said. "We aim to make the best tasting yogurt on the market, but consumers told us it (kosher yogurt) was important to them and we wanted to honor that request."

jeff saquella

that is not "greek" yogurt......across the street is the alpina plant and that is greek yogurt...they also make yogurt for yo crunch called "yopa" which is also greek and are also kosher but no tilapia in either

Sep 6, 2013, 7:11pm Permalink
Kyle Couchman

Just a lil input on that Jeff.... I bought some muller yogurt this afternoon @ Wally world. If you look at the label it is GREEK corner it is the product with the fruit mixture in the corner, it's advertised quite a bit on TV as well. So while fruit up may or may not be greek yogurt I do know that the Greek Corner is one of the products they plan to produce. And as Howard's main point of the article indicates, it is Kosher as it is marked with the official K for kosher. (if your shopping, alot of products are Kosher it' indicated on the packaging with either a K or a K with a circle around it and also the word "Pareve" near the K)

here are some examples... https://www.google.com/search?q=pareve+symbol&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:I…

Sep 6, 2013, 10:14pm Permalink
tom hunt

Interesting article on tilapia from China. I personally try to avoid any food stuff from China and SEA. Tuna fish I know is a big offender of hygene.

Sep 7, 2013, 12:19pm Permalink

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