Apr. 17--Two trucking companies near Omaha built kosher truck-tank washes to meet the demands of food manufacturers.
The washes are necessary for transportation of kosher food ingredients, an increasing portion of what's available on supermarket shelves.
Kosher foods are considered proper according to Jewish law and are strictly regulated and certified. Logos indicate which foods may be consumed by those who follow kosher dietary laws, and possibly by others with special dietary requirements, such as Muslims and Seventh-day Adventists.
The rules also apply to the equipment used to transport food ingredients.
Many food companies that once made both nonkosher and kosher versions of the same foods now make only kosher versions of their products. It is more efficient to manufacture all foods under the most stringent manufacturing guidelines rather than following different production procedures for kosher and nonkosher.
"Most companies now are totally kosher, totally following the kosher rules," said Rick Jasa. He and wife Linda Ingram-Jasa opened Ingram Tank Washes Inc., a double-bay kosher wash, in Blair, Neb., about two months ago. They also operate Jasa Transit, which hauls only kosher loads.
Among the thousands of popular food items that bear tiny symbols identifying them as kosher are Coca-Cola, Heinz ketchup, Listerine Pocketpak strips, Anheuser-Busch and Miller beers, and Kashi granola bars. The logos on those mainstream products might easily go unnoticed by the nonkosher consumer.
Trade magazine Kosher Today reported that about $190 billion, or 40 percent, of products sold in U.S. grocery stores in 2005 were kosher certified. Only about $10 billion of those products are believed to have been purchased specifically because they are kosher, according to Kosher Today.
The Orthodox Union, one of the organizations that certifies kosher products and monitors them throughout manufacture and transportation under the OU symbol, reported that some nonkosher consumers seek out kosher products because of concern for food safety and quality. Kosher products also might be preferred by consumers who are lactose intolerant or vegetarian, the OU said.
Kosher laws originated in the Bible and include categories of food that are not allowed, including certain animals, fowl, fish (such as pork, rabbit, eagle, owl, catfish and sturgeon), and all shellfish, insects and reptiles, according to the OU.
There are strict rules about slaughter and food preparation, and all ingredients must meet the requirements. Equipment used to prepare nonkosher food cannot be used on kosher food unless it has been cleaned with a special process.
At OFC/Schmidt Liquid Service in Plattsmouth, Neb., co-owners Roger Schmidt and Mike Beins reserve some of their 110 trailer-tanks as kosher certified. They said they are careful to follow the strict rules about how they can use those trailers.
"You can't haul a load of soybean oil to the West Coast and haul grape juice back in the same tank," Schmidt said. "Animal fat is taboo. They don't want you to haul milk."
During a kosher wash, water is held at a higher temperature for a longer period of time, usually at least 190 degrees for at least 15 minutes. The process specifies standards for water filtering for particulates, for pre-rinsing and final rinsing, and for detergents used in wash cycles. Each tank is sealed with numbers that correspond to paperwork for the wash.
In Blair, Jasa said he and his wife spent about $1 million on the kosher wash and its facility, with about half the investment going for the pumps, boiler and other equipment.
His company spent $450,000 last year alone on kosher washes for their trucks, Jasa said. Now they wash their own trucks as well as charge other companies to wash theirs.
Some trucks belonging to other companies might not need a kosher wash, but they get one anyway.
"If we do a wash, it's easier to make everything a kosher wash. And we're meeting the highest standard across the board," Jasa said.
The Jasas' computerized systems -- from Sani-Matic Inc. of Madison, Wis. -- include digital keypads allowing operators to request different types of washes depending on what was in the tank.
The wash systems produce printouts that are kept on file and inspected by a rabbi from the organization that certified the tank wash as kosher. Each truck tank also must be individually kosher certified. If a non-kosher food is hauled in the tank, the tank must be recertified as kosher.
Schmidt said he and Beins realized that if they didn't open a kosher wash they would have to continue paying thousands of dollars a month for their trucks to be properly washed elsewhere. Their double-bay kosher wash opened about two years ago and cost, like Jasa's wash, about $1 million.
Schmidt said he began his research by traveling the country to observe what the best kosher washes offered. Then he began creating his own wash, rather than buying a system from a vendor.
"I engineered this on my own. I'd been studying this for a long time," Schmidt said.
After tallying the number of hours he spent on the computerized wash system, though, Schmidt bought the second wash setup from Floyd Peacock Co. Inc. of Dallas.
Kosher trucking will increase as the number of kosher products continues to increase, he said.
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