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Someone told me that there are kashrus problems with Ricola candies? Can anyone add any details to support or refute?
If you trust the hechsher on the pack, then what’s the problem?
check into it if you are not sure about it, everyone holds differently with these things
If you are buying from a kosher supermarket ask the mashgiach in the store.
they say the ones without a hechsher are no good
I have heard (and I can NOT vouch for this) that they are all good, but that a mashgiach only comes a few times a year to do certain runs that he supervises and labels with his hashgacha, but that there is nothing different in that run in terms of ingredients from any other run.
If you need cough drops, you should buy the generic Halls. The actual Halls brand doesn’t have a hechsher, but the generic ones, CVS etc., have an OU-D. (I imagine it’s equipment, but don’t rely on me for that.)
You should get these because they have the most menthol of any cough drops, and that is what makes your throat feel better.
At the risk of asking a silly question, why not just contact your LOR if you have questions about Ricola (or any other brand)?
The Wolf
Yitzy B.
as of matter of fact contact should b made to a rav about anything that u have a question on
the best thing that should work is a hot tea with some good flavor or a vaporizer that could also help
breathing in to boiling hot water in a pot with a towel over your head. the old fashion way works the best
My husband asked a well-known posek in Yerushalayim who specializes in kashrus issues, he said that those under Rav Shlesinger are fine.
who is Rav Shlesinger?
It looks like he’s a rav in Switzerland; his name is on most of the Ricola packages sold here in Israel.
I used to buy the type with the hechsher. Then I started to follow what AinOhdMilvado mentioned and what I had heard: that as long as the ingredients match up it’s ok, which totally makes sense. They don’t have a special recipe for the ones with the kosher symbol. It is sort of the same thing with twizzlers, which have an o-u, but paskesz repackages with a different hechsher. It’s just put there the reassure people that what they are eating is actually kosher – up to their standard in the twizzler example.
I had a similar issue when Eeees and I went to St. Thomas. We went to the local supermarket and were surprised to find that the Coca-Cola in St. Thomas did not have a hechsher. I figured it was simply a lack of a mashgiach at the plant and not that it was truly not kosher.
In the end, we didn’t buy it, simply because Coca Cola isn’t all that important to us and kashrus is. But if I had to bet money on it, I would have given given dollars to donughts that it was, in fact, kosher. They don’t make special treif Coke just for the Virgin Islands.
The Wolf
relying on svoros for Kashrus is a dangerous and slippery road
i suppose with cough drops, which is not exactly derech achila its a bit safer
not a good habit though
relying on svoros for Kashrus is a dangerous and slippery road
It was a “dangerous and slippery road” for me to find another beverage besides Coke??? I reasoned that even though it was most likely kosher (and I would have been willing to bet money on it*), I was better off without it. How is that reasoning dangerous or indicative of a slippery slope?
Are you suggesting that I should have bought the Coke?
The Wolf
* Yes, I know that makes me pasul l’eidus.
Coca Cola is actually formulated differently in different countries. The Mexican variety is supposedly much sweeter.
Coca Cola is actually formulated differently in different countries. The Mexican variety is supposedly much sweeter.
Is it really? Do you have a cite for that? I was under the impression that they make the (same) syrup for everyone in the world.
The Wolf
(Yes, I know that one poster thinks that my requests for citations are annoying and obnoxious, but so be it)
Wolf – It was a “dangerous and slippery road” for me to find another beverage besides Coke???
Try Pepsi (it’s MUCH better!)
According to Ricola’s website:
All of our cough, throat and vitamin C drops are Kosher and are manufactured in Laufen, Switzerland. If a copy of the kosher certificate is needed, please write to [email protected] requesting a certificate and providing us with a fax number or address to forward a copy.
Source:
they say the ones without a hechsher are no good
The packages with and without the labels are under the same hechsher.
Is it really? Do you have a cite for that? I was under the impression that they make the (same) syrup for everyone in the world.
Mexico heavily taxes corn syrup sweetened drinks.
Wolf – It was a “dangerous and slippery road” for me to find another beverage besides Coke???
Huh? We *didn’t* buy the Coke.
(Sorry… I’m not a Pepsi fan. We went with iced tea which did have a hechsher)
The Wolf
Mexico heavily taxes corn syrup sweetened drinks.
Interesting. I did not know that.
Fortunately, I was still in the United States (even though it wasn’t a state).
The Wolf
let’s just all feel good and not have to cough.
let’s just all feel good and not have to cough.
Funny you should say that because I’ve been fighting a cough for a few days already. 🙂
The Wolf
If you are someone who is makpid on Pos-Tiv or KJ or any of the other extra special hechsheirim, and you are a choleh sh’ain bo sakono, you would want find an alternate to Ricola.
this problem acctually bothered me a couple of years ago that even if u go to nj in some stores pepsi and coke have no hechser so i called up the o u and kof k sopoke to one of the head rabbi who both told me that i should not buy if it has no hechser it is not so much as change of ing it could be that what they made bf on the machines was not kosher they named some drinks that are made by same company on the same machines that r outride not kosher yes they wash inbetween but when they have a hecher they make sure what was done bf how hot the machines r washed…and both hechsers said without a hechser dont buy
Is the kashrus status of Ricola any different whether it has the special kosher sticker on it?
If a product comes out in versions with and without a hecksher, one should be wary of buying the ones without a hecksher. The cost of assuring a production is kosher is fixed, so if the whole output is kosher, why don’t they say so. If only some are kosher, we should assume they did a special “kosher run” and changed something (e.g. using a kosher red dye rather than carmine made from crushed insects).
If cough drops are a food, their halachic status is different than if they are a medicine. For example, one rabbinate says the “Hall’s” is kosher only for sick people – suggesting it meets the standard for a medicine, but not for a food. At least in the northeastern United States, there are plenty of similar products available with a reputable hecksher – so why buy something without a hecksher and risk eating mamash bugs?
I found this on the ricola dot com website’s FAQ section:
Are all your products Kosher?
All of our bagged cough, throat and vitamin C drops sold in the US are kosher (Ricola Kosher Certificate (PDF-Download) attached). Our drops that are sold in sticks are not.
The linked PDF is a hashgacha from a Rav Avraham Yaffe-Schlesinger in Geneve, Switzerland, whom I’m not familiar with.
According to the Ricola website, ALL of their bagged cough drops are kosher, and they have a copy of the certificate saying so posted there. It’s possible that some people don’t want to rely on that hechsher, so a Rav may come in to observe a few runs, and stick his label on it.
The kashrus status is the same either way – it’s kosher!
DaMoshe, The certificate provided on their website is signed by the same person who signed the stickers. The stickers are merely a marketing scam to get people to purchase the product from a frum store instead of CVS or Walmart.
That being said, there are different standards in Kashrus, and not all Ricolas meet everyone’s standards. I have spoken to other agencies in Europe who have visited the plant and were not happy with the Kashrus standards there.
Many American hashgochos do not accept all Ricolas, only specific flavors. A list can be found on the cRc Chicgao’s website.
Annonymouschochom – your post contradicts itself. The stickers are a scam to make people by them at kosher stores but the ones without stickers may have kashrus issues. That reminds me of the joke where someone complains about the food at school: It tastes awful and there isn’t enough of it.
Wolf, how’s your cough?
Syag Lchochma- You obviously did not understand my post.
With stickers and without stickers is exactly the same. They are all under the same supervision. All of them also have the issues I mentioned, both with stickers and without. There is no difference between the ones with the stickers and the packages sole in Walmart, besides the price.
I don’t know if you are correct or not but thank you for clarifying what you said.
It seems like the claim is that there’s a difference in the level of supervision.
The ones with the stickers are from ???? ??? ????? ?????, which sounds like there’s a special production which is personally supervised.
http://www.ricola.com/en-us/Resources/PDF/Koshercertificate-worldwide.pdf
The CRC website lists certain flavors as recommended. They don’t list any as “not recommended,” as they do for some other brands of cough drops. Possibly they don’t want to publicly contradict Rabbi Schlesinger.
DaasYochid, Now I see you are correct. He writes on the letter that the ones with stickers are under ????? ?????. HOWEVER, that does not mean there is any difference in the product. All that means is that he is in the building during production. Riccola does not change their ingredients or their sources when he is standing the plant. A company that size rarely changes their formulas ever.
I have spoken with European Rabonim who visited the plant. They had real issues with the sources of some of the flavorings. That is why there are “lists”. When these Rabonim go in, they create a list of non-problematic flavors.
yehudayona- cRc Chicago would never declare “not recommended” on any item which has any kosher certification whatsoever. Even a non-frum one. They would get sued for that. That is why on their Directory of Kosher Agencies that have a disclaimer “The fact that a particular agency does not appear on this list does not imply that the cRc has determined it to be substandard.” That is so they will not get sued for leaving someone off their list.
P.S. The certifying agency for Ricola is not on that list.
“The stickers are merely a marketing scam to get people to purchase the product from a frum store instead of CVS or Walmart.”
There is a wonderful health food store on White Plains Road in the Bronx, right off Pelham Parkway that has the ones with the stickers.
Along the lines of what cherrybim said, the Star-K gives hashgacha to certain national brand packaged salads. If there’s no Star-K inkjetted on with the bar code, it’s because they deem that batch infested. I’ve seen such packages with a yellow sticker from a heimishe hashgacha. I have a hard time believing that that sticker isn’t fraudulent.
It could be that they are all the same but the company thought printing the hechsher would keep antisemites from buying it so they only put stickers on some packages.
The ones with the stickers are from ???? ??? ????? ?????, which sounds like there’s a special production which is personally supervised.
But is anything done differently? He already stated that they are Kosher Lemehadrin. Do the stickers have any additional claims that are absent in the letter?
To me his claim “They are Kosher” is as trustworthy as “I was there and they are Kosher”.
I don’t know what a claim being trustworthy means.
The bottom line is that although as long as the ingredients and process follow acceptable standards, it’s muttar to eat, but there’s less concern that there is a deviation from those ingredients and that process if there’s a mashgiach actually present, and some people are more comfortable that way. It certainly cannot be called a scam.
The Rav Shlesinger of Yerushalayim is not the same as Rav Shlesinger listed on the Ricola candies that have a hechsher.
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