New York – The price of a gallon of Cholov Yisroel (higher standard kosher milk) reached $6.40 a gallon in some places in New York State last week. The soaring prices for kosher milk are part of the steadily rising prices for kosher foods in general.While the average price for a ½ gallon of the special kosher milk was just under $3.00, it was as high as $3.20 in the Catskills, partially due to the higher costs for transportation. Milk in general has been going up, largely due to the increased costs of dairy farming which requires a great deal of fuel.
In addition, the price of corn that farmers use to feed cows was also skyrocketing. In New York State, the price of milk is regulated by the Department of Agriculture, which last week raised the threshold price for a gallon of milk in the city to $4.37, citing increased demand and high production costs.
The Cholov Yisroel milk was generally 50 cents higher than the regular milk, largely due to increased costs for kosher supervision and distribution. The higher milk costs are also having an effect on all related dairy items, including cheese, sour cream and yogurts.
Jewish organizations say that the recent spade of sharply higher prices for dairy and meat is having a devastating effect on large families and people with fixed income. They point out that the food basket is nearly a third higher for kosher consumers than it was a year ago at this time, with additional increases pending for both meat and dairy products.
Bakery goods have also gone up dramatically due to sharply higher costs for wheat. Kosher distributors tell KosherToday that the cost of feeding a family this coming Rosh Hashanah holiday will be significantly higher than it was on Passover. “I used to raise prices once or twice a year; now it’s weekly,” said a New York distributor.
(Source: Kosher Today)
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42 Responses
Are the liberals and the Saudis happy that milk is so expensive? Folks, don’t think that the “other” milk is much cheaper. It is not! But, are they happy that my son-in-law and daughter are struggling to make ends meet to properly feed my ainikil? Are they happy?
Ummm…wow. Speechless.
Should we start drinking gas?
I know someone who lives out of town and cholov yisroel milk cost almost 4 dollars a gallon!
If you are going to write in saying anything about C”Y vs Cholov Stamm, I am not interested so dont bother wasting your time. …..
I don’t understand it but for whatever reason C”Y milk coming from the NY area spoils so much faster than its Cholov Stamm cousins. I am sure if the health departments were watching this, they would find legitimate problems someplace. I am not sure if the problems are at the manufacturer, the distributor, or even on store level but needless to say there is a problem. You could purchase two bottles of milk the same day, one C”Y and the other Cholov Stamm, and I can guarantee you that the Cholov Yisroel would spoil MUCH faster – within days. This is no matter how far out they are dated.
I would also ask why C”Y milk so much more “watery” tasting than their Stamm counterparts? I am referring to milk with the “same” fat content.
I have an answer to these questions. The C”Y milk companies feel that they are serving a specialty market and that their customers don’t have a choice so they are forced to buy C”Y. My question to them is whether or not they have ever thought of the numerous “borderline” customers they could have, i.e., those consumers who would perhaps purchase C”Y milk all things being equal. My guess is not.
This is a quality issue they won’t address. If a Cholov Stamm company had these issues, they would be out of business before they knew what hit them.
When you complain to the stores or to the companies they all point fingers at each other. Let them all keep the fridges/trucks at 33 degrees and there will be less problems. The stores should also put the milk in the cooler right away instead of letting it sit out.
In comment #3 I meant a half gallon.
One more thing…
Why wont the NY area milk companies bottle GALLONS of milk which would be cheaper than the half gallons? You get a family that goes thru milk and they could save some money.
Of course Golden Flow / New Square etc., dont care about you.
Can somebody please explain why Cholov Yisroel milk is so much higher than regular milk? It does not seem that having a mashgiach sitting and watchng the cows should cost so much money.
hmmmm. I live in the 5 towns where food prces are generally higher and we are still paying 2.50 for half a gallon (which would be $5 for a gallon) any reason why this is?
(I guess it cost more to ship it to the catskills.)
Don’t blame the Saudis for your insistence on keeping every chumra in the book. Oh and by the way, the “other” milk that “other” people drink is actually significantly cheaper. Maybe your son in law and daughter will realize that providing the proper nutrition for your ainikil is more important than trying to keep up with the “Holier than Thous”.
And Jewess, yes you should definitely start drinking gas, because we all know that when society has stooped so low as to force us to choose between satiating our chumra craving souls or saving a little money that would be better off going to charity, the only option is to drink toxic liquids. Yehareg V’al Yaavor.
to ayin tov – I think you meant almost $4.00 a half gallon.
I guess it’s a good thing that cars don’t run on milk, gas is still cheaper!
Mark Levin – I am compelled to apologize – I did not see your comment when I posted mine – otherwise, I never would have written something that YOU were not interested in. What a waste of time..
xoxo, you are either ignorant or lying maliciously. Even R’ Moshe wrote clearly in a letter published by the OU that his leniency was not intended to be used merely to save money, but was meant for those who were unable to find CY milk at all. There is what to rely on to be lenient, but this is not a holier-than- thou thing.
good. let goldenflow mafia raise the price while I happily drink shoprite milk for 25% less then goldenflow mafia milk.
To xoxo (number 9): You refer to cholov Yisroel as a chumra. I would not call a takanas Chazal a chumra. Would you call neiros Chanukah or hafrashas challah in chutz la’aretz a chumra? How about bishul Akum or pas Akum? Are these chunmras? Simply because a great posek finds a legitimate heter for drinking chalav akum does not relegate the takanah a chumra. You have every right to be lenient in the matter, but choosing to follow the takanah as stated is not a chumra.
Mark, the reason they don’t ship full gallons is that if, for whatever reason, let’s say Chalav Yisrael milk does spoil faster than Chalav Stam, it would be illogical and impractical to sell a container that holds a greater quantity of Chalav Yisrael milk, as it would create even more bad will for their customers that instead of, say, 1/16th of a gallon spoiling, you’d end up with 9/16th of a gallon spoiling.
In other words, if, when a typical consumer buys a half-gallon of CY milk, and they don’t end up being able to finish the bottle before it spoils, why would one want a CY bottle with double the amount of milk – so all that additional milk could spoil, too?
I wonder what this thread would look like it we were NOT in the middle of the “three weeks.”
#7, it costs more because the market is much smaller for CY milk and the competition is less. Regular milk has many brands competing against each other to make it the cheapest, while the CY milk companies don’t have that incentive. We don’t have that many choices.
Where I live its already $4 for 1/2 gallon.
While not sticking up in any way for the companies that like to rake it in on us… Please DON’T compare cholov Yisroel to cholov shtam. Most poskim hold that it is not permitted, and from what I heard even R Moshe Feinstein was only matir when there is no alternative. Please look up the tsuva.
I’m sorry but I started buying my milk at Costco. It costs about 3.40 a GALLON and lasts for about 2 1/2 weeks. It also has a big OU on the bottle.
It is a shame that a gallon of CHOLOV Yisroel milk should cost $2.00 more per gallon. Todays farms are all automated, there is no way that the price of the hashgacha should add more than 2 or cents to yhe price of the milk.
The cholov yisroel companies are taking advantage of the public.
BTW, how do they get away with charging $2.00 more than the price set by the State?
Mark,you are very right about the cholov Yisroel spoiling much quicker than the Cholov Stam especially 1 of the 2 major brands. I also see that the kosher stores are to diligent in making sure that their refrigeration are up to par and also in making sure that products requiring refrigeration are done so promptly. Often i go to a store at 8-9 and cases and cases of milk are sitting in front of the refrigerators knowing that the milk was delivered hours before.
You also need to be careful where you buy eggs.
Many stores don’t refrigerate eggs which can be a major cause of Salmonella. It has gotten better lately where a couple of years ago the eggs would just sit outside the refrigerators.
Ha! That’s nothing in Florida it is 8.38 a gallon. Soy milk is running around 8.76 a gallon for the cheap kind. I wonder which one will eventually be the less expensive option?
I asked both of Rav Moshe ZTL’s sons, who should know better than everybody else, if we can buy Chalav Stamm milk Lchatchilah, and both said ‘yes’. So please everybody stop with the ‘I heard this and I heard that’ business.
14: Chalav Yisrael IS a chumra. Milk with the “Real” sign is cow’s milk. It is not Chalav Akum. It is Chalav Stam.
dave, THANK YOU! Finally someone who knows what they are talking about.
To the other posters who are so convinced that chalav yisrael is not just a chumra, there is no point in arguing with you, as you have already convinced yourself or have been convinced that this is what is truly important in bringing Mashiach one step closer. I am all too familiar with people like you, and to be honest, I feel sorry that you expend all your energy focusing on chumros, when there are so many halachos that have all but fallen by the wayside. The fact that somebody actually compares keeping chalav yisrael to neiros Chanuka just reiterates my point.
# 9, # 25 – many poskim, Rav Breuer zt”l included, forbade people to drink Cholov Akum even when Cholov Yisroel was not available [I have a written teshuva from him]. It is not just a chumra!
#21 – an OU does not make it cholov yisroel. Lots of dairy products have an OU – but they are not cholov yisroel.
cholov yisroel milk taste better!
25, WADR, without a last name and contact info, forgive me for not taking your word for it.
#30,
I told you who I asked. Both Rav Dovid and Rav Reuven’s phone numbers are in the phone book. I can’t believe we are debating this issue when the people who ‘heard this and that’ can’t be bothered to go the source. BTW, my e-mail is XXXXXXX
Edited by Site Moderation Panel.
And as everybody knows, when I went to MTJ, the candy machines sold Hersheys, even when Rav Moshe was alive. Somehow there inconvenient facts are ignored by the ‘the heter was only if you are living 4 hours away from the nearest CY store’ crowd.
Bubby, did your children apply to WIC? Free milk for children!
Reb moshe(no relation to me) tshuva is printed. Eberybody can read it. ONLY when there was no option of CY was he matir it. Even if it ha sthe “real sign does NOT negate the Takonos Chazal. LETS STOP UP FOR KOVOD HATORAH!@!!!
I quoted what R’ Moshe wrote explicitly to Rabbi Ochs in Toronto. This letter was published in the OU Daf Hakashrus a number of years ago IN HIS HANDWRITING. Call the OU and get it. So he argues with his sons over what he held unless you say that things may be different now, which is already the opinion of his sons and not a psak of his.
#35
So I guess his sons didn’t read his teshuvah.
I’m kicking myself for bothering to argue with people who I know won’t hear what I’m saying, but I guess YW brings out the best in all of us…
Do you honestly think that you know what R’ Moshe meant more than his sons? The only reason R’ Moshe even wrote what he did was to spare himself the aggravation that he was receiving from people like you. Sadly many rabbanim do the same nowadays. It’s just not worth it to give a real psak to all these chumra shoppers, so they’re forced to give people the answer they are looking for. You can argue all you want, but I heard that directly from a very prominent rav.
#37
I’m not sure what you mean by “his sons”, because both Reb Dovid and Reb Ruvain are makbid. Certaily they were mikabel after Reb Moshe’s petira.
Why not apply a good hechsher to an existing, non-cholov yisroel dairy? They seem to be able to keep the prices down! How much would a hechsher cost them already? They’d make it back quickly with increased sales.
I heard from an inside source that in Rav Moshe’s house there were two varieties of milk in the refrigerator: Cholov Yisroel, that he himself drank (as a personal chumra), and Cholov Stam, for the other members of his household.
Number 26 (Jewess): (a) Rav Moshe writes — it can be found in his Igros Moshe — that Yeshivos have no heter to serve their students non-cholov Yisroel milk. (b) The candy machines in the Yeshivah were not the Yeshivos. (c) There are a number of things that his sons paskin differnly than their father. (d) Factory milk or chalov stam was a phrase coined by Rav Moshe. Chalov Yisroel it is not. Chalov akum — that is assur according to everyone it is not either. Without Rav Moshe’s lomdus, however, this TOO would qualify as chalov Akum. About that there is NO doubt. None of this is speculation.
There is no reason that you must feel insecure by others who are more stringent than you. Just look at how ludicrous you sound. R’ Moshe himself wrote that it is ro’uy lihachmir in yd2,31, and in the letter printed by the OU (not exactly the most stringent regarding milk) IN HIS HANDWRITING says that he only meant it bishas hadchak vlo mishum yoker (I will try to scan and upload it after getting permission). Now you come and slander him that he wrote these things under pressure. This just because you feel that it contradicts the opinion of his sons. There are other possible explanations, among them that they are more lenient than him and are not saying that this was his opinion, or that they feel that he would be more lenient now than he was then. The second was told by R’ Dovid to a friend of mine. Either one represents their opinion, which is worthy of reckoning, but not their father’s. Many close disciples are more stringent than they are. If you wish to follow them, so be it, but there is no reason to attack those who follow what R’ Moshe explicitly wrote, unless it is out of ignorance or maliciousness. This is of course besides the possibility that people may be following opinions of other great poskim who strongly disagreed with the leniency.
according to harav moshe ztl, if anyone is a true yira shamayim he will only have cholov yisrael. with that said, i must say that ppl are willing to spend money on fancy clothing etc. but to pay an extra couple of bucks on zchar they cant reach inside their pockets.