Kosher and 6 Israeli Innovations That Changed the World • Yes That Kosher

Last year I attended the opening of Israeli chef Guy Vaknin, a vegan kosher restaurant run by Annecy, which is making great efforts to serve Israeli and Mediterranean-style meat and fish dishes, but using only plant-based products. doing. This would be in line with Waknin's other restaurants, notably Beyond Sushi, which offers an entire menu of delicious fishless sushi options.

It was at the Annecy opening ceremony, when I tried a piece of steak, or at least it looked and tasted like steak, that blew my mind. It was actually a plant-based item from Chunk, an Israeli startup that wants to create delicious, nutritious, plant-based whole pieces of “meat” (which is totally pareve) that are friendly to the environment, and Are accessible to everyone. The company appears to have beef as its first target, but pork, lamb and poultry are next. This means we could possibly be tasting kosher, pareve “pork” in the near future.

Another sustainable innovation is Bee-IO, an Israeli company that makes honey with virtually zero bees. We know the world is struggling to maintain bee populations, and this company is trying to recreate the taste, viscosity, and texture of authentic honey without the use of the insects we've depended on for millennia. have been relying on to make it happen, and it has already been done successfully. B-IO enables a year-round supply of honey at a fair price – allowing bees to resume their traditional role of pollination.

While this doesn't necessarily solve the sustainability issue, 7th Heaven chocolate is similar to the other Israeli-made food products in this article in that they don't rely on animal products or by-products to create something of top quality. Their various flavors of chocolate are all creamy enough that you would claim they were milk chocolate, but all are completely pareve, with oat and/or coconut milk to add creamy texture and flavor to their selection of chocolate bars. is used to. 7th Heaven Chocolate was recently featured at the Kosherpalooza Food Festival and it is probably the best chocolate I have ever tasted, dairy or pareve. All of their chocolate bars are OU certified, pareve, and already available for sale in the US today. [This product is also available for sale today in Israel under the Panda Chocolate brand name],

3D-printed pareve meat is now very popular in Israel and it is more advanced than we know.
Redefine Meats already has its kosher pareve “meat” products on shelves in supermarkets throughout Israel and Europe, and served in Israeli kosher restaurants such as Bodega in Tel Aviv, Black Iron, Crave, Kinor Bakikar, Beerbazaar and Ca Fe Hanoi. going. Machne Asada, Nocturno and Ruhan in Jerusalem, as well as a few others throughout Israel.

Redefine Meat uses AI, machine learning, and 3D printing of plant-based ingredients to bring its sustainable products to the mass market. The company already has a dozen products on shelves including kosher pareve pulled beef, pulled pork, lamb kebabs, tenderloins and more.

Stakeholder Foods is another 3D meat company that maintains facilities in Rehovot, Israel. The company is developing slaughter-free solutions for the production of a variety of beef, chicken, pork and seafood products – both as raw materials and whole pieces – as an alternative to industrial farming and fishing. Its steaks and fishes use real animal cells without killing or harming those animals, so technically these aren't necessarily pareve (we'll let the rabbis decide) or vegan, since real animal cells are used in labs. Developed in to develop the basis for these. Food ingredient.

PM Bibi Netanyahu recently visited Stakeholder Foods to taste fish made by the company's 3D food printer, which is made from real fish cells:

Aleph Farms is another startup tackling similar issues with meat, which has already attracted investment from Ashton Kutcher and Leonardo DiCaprio, and the company is working on Aleph Cuts to create products and dishes using its cultured steaks. Has partnered with celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson. Who was quoted about the partnership: “It is essential that we look for new ways to sustainably feed our planet, which is why I was drawn to the mission of Aleph Farms as a chef and an investor. As in, took part in bringing forth the delicious.” , farmed meat to the table. Right now, it is a leading movement and I think it will become more important and common in our lives. What once seemed futuristic – like electric cars – soon becomes familiar. This is a game-changing moment in the industry to invest in the future, and I'm excited to partner with an innovative company like Aleph Farms.

Why does it matter?

Given Israel's penchant for innovations across many industries, it is not surprising to see that many Israeli companies are tackling issues that affect the future of both food and the environment. Animal consumption was not a manufactured and industrial process for most of human history. However, over the past 100 years or so, the industrialization of animal farming has made the treatment of animals less humane as well as polluting the Earth worse than fossil fuel emissions.

Although we do not expect to do without animal products in our lifetime, removing some of the burden of livestock for the well-being and sustainability of humanity, progress in this industry is welcome – particularly the exciting progress coming from Israel.