by LEIBY BURNHAM | May 3, 2024 4:11 pm
Dairy cows are prodigious producers. You pump about one hundred pounds of feed into a dairy cow over the course of a day; usually a mixture of hay, grain, soybean meal or some other protein, and silage, which is fermented wet grass or grain. While it sits there placidly ruminating, all sorts of machinery starts whirring in its belly, and before you know it, it’s ready to give you a few gallons of milk. It’ll do that twice a day, generally hooking you up with six to seven gallons of milk total. That milk can then be used to make dozens of products, from skim milk to butter, cottage cheese to brie. Cows have been doing this for millennia and seem to be perfectly ok with their job, but just like us humans see ourselves rapidly being replaced by robots and machines, the dairy cow knows that her days are numbered.
Walk into any Whole Foods Market or Trader Joe’s and you will see dozens of competitors to that dairy milk. You’ve probably tasted almond milk, there’s nothing new about that product, it was talked about already in the Jewish Code of Law (SA, YD, 87:3), which was first published in 1565. But today, we’ve gone way beyond almond milk; we have soy milk, rice milk, oat milk, cashew milk, walnut milk, tiger nut milk, coconut milk, spelt milk, quinoa milk, pea milk, flax milk, hemp milk, and oh so many more.
These milks are far cheaper to produce because instead of feeding Betsy a hundred pounds of food a day, including soy beans, oats, spelt etc, you can just turn that food straight into milk, cutting out the middlemoo. A pound of soybeans can make 1.8 gallons of soy milk, thirty almonds can make a half gallon of almond milk, and a few cups of oats can make a half gallon of oat milk. On top of that, after making the milks, you still have a valuable product in the leftover mashed up soybeans, almonds or oats!
It is not just manufacturers that are looking to bring more alternative milks to market due to their lower costs, the demand side is growing as well. The world of alternative milks is exploding in popularity. A few years ago, hipsters from Brooklyn to Boise, soccer moms from San Mateo to Savanna, and millennials from Nashville to Norfolk were all united in their outrage that there was simply no Oatly to be had. The trendy Swedish oat milk company had ramped up production tenfold, but it still could not meet the insatiable demand for the trendiest of alternative milks. Sainsbury, a popular grocery chain in England stocks seventy different alternative milk options, and in the US nearly half of all consumers add an alternative milk to their baskets at the supermarket.
Betsy’s favorite offering on the other hand, is plummeting in popularity; from 1970 to 2023 the number of dairy farms in the US plummeted from 460,000 to over 28,000! While some of that is due to consolidation of farms into megafarms, a lot of that is due to the fact that Americans simply don’t drink as much milk. In the last thirty years, per capita consumption of milk in the US is down by about 33%! The only thing that Betsy has going for her right now, is that no one can make ice cream like Betsy, and we still do love ourselves some ice cream!
But it is not only the dairy cow that is under attack, her cousins the meat cattle are as well. By the time it is brought to the slaughterhouse, a cow is usually between 1000-1350 lbs, and all that cow had to come from somewhere. An enormous amount of resources go into producing a pound of meat, and surprisingly water is one of the most important ones, especially when we consider the vast amounts of beef being raised in Western states that have undergone droughts recently. Meat production currently sucks down 8% of the world’s water supply! Producing a pound of beef takes 1,799 gallons of water, which contrasts to a pound of soybean which takes 216 gallons or a pound of corn which requires only 108 gallons.
Part of this is because a cow will eat thousands of pounds of corn or soybean before going to market, and part of this is because such a high percentage of a cow is inedible. But the primary reason is that cattle lives the longest lives of any protein. A chicken typically lives between five to seven weeks, a lamb six to eight months, but a cow will consume food and water for fifteen to eighteen months before being finally converted to beef. Most of the food will be grass, beef cattle are usually grazed for the first nine months of their lives, until they are brought to a feedlot where they fatten them up with a diet more heavy in grains and corn. But once they start fattening them, they will dine on a couple thousand pounds of feed. What if we could just turn the grains into meat and cut out the middlemoo?
Today, there are dozens of companies producing meat alternatives. Some are vegan, made entirely of plants, such as the “meat” produced by Impossible Foods, which uses heme, an iron-containing molecule that they claim gives meat its meaty flavor. Their products require 75% less water, and create 87% less greenhouse gases when compared to standard meat. The Impossible Burger, their signature accomplishment is kosher, made primarily of potato, soy, and heme, and even looks like a real burger; brown on the outside, red and “bleeding” on the inside. I’ve had quite a few Impossible Burgers, and they are actually really good. I wouldn’t say they taste exactly like meat, but they are miles ahead of the soyburgers we’ve been eating until now.
But the more cutting-edge meat alternative companies, are creating actual meat, but not from a walking breathing cow. These companies start with meat cells, and stimulate them in a lab to keep growing. As of right now, the costs are prohibitive, but Tyson and Cargill, the two largest producers of meat in the country have invested in Memphis Meats, the front runner in the cell-based meat development here in the US.
So milk no longer comes from a cow, meat no longer come from a cow. Dorothy, we are no longer in Kansas.
Many people find this development disconcerting. They feel like we are playing G-d, and trying to change the natural order of the world. They will cite the long list of ingredients in almond milk, many with strange sounding chemical names. In my refrigerator, we have regular milk and almond milk. The regular milk has three ingredients; milk, vitamin A, and vitamin D. The almond milk (unsweetened) has 11 ingredients including some I have can barely pronounce; gellan gum, locust bean gum, ergocalciferol, DL-Alpha tocopherol acetate, tricalcium phosphate.
When it comes to meat, the difference is even starker. While a regular burger contains one ingredient: cow, the Impossible Burger contains: Water, Soy Protein Concentrate, Coconut Oil, Sunflower Oil, Natural Flavors, 2% or less of: Potato Protein, Methylcellulose, Yeast Extract, Cultured Dextrose, Food Starch Modified, Soy Leghemoglobin, Salt, Soy Protein Isolate, Mixed Tocopherols (Vitamin E), Zinc Gluconate, Thiamine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B1), Sodium Ascorbate (Vitamin C), Niacin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B6), Riboflavin (Vitamin B2), Vitamin B12.
People fear that when we start messing with nature, bad things will happen. But that’s not necessarily how we see it from a Jewish perspective. We believe that G-d created the world in such a way that we were supposed to be partners with Ha-shem in the creation of a perfect world. When Ha-shem finishes creating the world, the Torah says (Genesis 2:2-3), “And God completed on the seventh day His work that He did, and He abstained on the seventh day from all His work that He did. And God blessed the seventh day and He hallowed it, for thereon He abstained from all His work that God created to do.” The commentators ask that the last two words of that verse seem to be just hanging there with no purpose, why not just say that on the Seventh day, G-d abstained from all His work that God created?
But the commentators explain that the Torah is telling you here the purpose of the world, G-d created the world for us to do. G-d created a perfectly imperfect world, so that we could be His partners in perfecting the world. G-d created 99.9%, and then endowed us with His image, His ability to create, so that we too could create further and make the world better.
G-d created wheat, we make bread, G-d created grapes, we make wine. The natural world has cancer, G-d gave us the ability to develop chemotherapy. The natural world is dark at night, G-d gave us the wisdom to discover electricity and light up the night. The natural world has pneumonia, which used to often be a death sentence, but He gave us humans a job to do, and we created antibiotics. In every generation, people face different challenges, and in every generation G-d beckons us to use the wisdom He endowed us with to meet and best those challenges.
We live in a generation that is facing a host of environmental challenges, feeding 7.5 billion in an environmentally conscious way high among them. When I see people creating alternatives to traditional foods, alternatives that are often healthier and better for the environment, it fills me with pride to see humans carrying out their role in this world, to do.
May Ha-shem continue to endow us with His infinite wisdom, and may we continue to use that wisdom to partner with Him in creating a better world!
Parsha Dvar Torah
In this week’s Parsha, we read about the service that was performed on Yom Kippur in the Temple times. It was an elaborate and lengthy service, performed almost exclusively by the Kohen Gadol, the High Priest, under the watchful eyes of throngs of Jews who had come to be part of the Day of Atonement service. It included many things not seen any other time of the year. There was a uniform worn by the Kohen Gadol only on Yom Kippur. It was the only day of the year where someone entered the Holy of Holies to perform services on behalf of the Jewish people in that sacred chamber.
But there was one detail that often gets overlooked that was also unique to Yom Kippur. It is the only time of the year that the blood of two sacrifices is intentionally mixed, and then used in sacrificial sprinklings. There was a bull brought by the Kohen Gadol, upon which the Kohen Gadol performed to viduy confessional recitations, one on behalf of his own family, one on behalf of the entire Kohen group. Later a goat was brough, upon which the Kohen Gadol performed a confessional for the entire Jewish people. Later, their blood was mixed and applied to the corners and top of the Golden Altar, which was inside the Holy area of the Temple. What is the meaning behind this unique service?
One of the commentators (I’m so sorry, I can’t find which one, I saw it yesterday, but can’t remember where!) reveals to us a beautiful idea. Yom Kippur is the day we ask for atonement, and G-d is telling us, “You want atonement? I want to see My People mixed one with another. I don’t want to see the “big Jews” separated from the “little Jews.” Not a rabbinical class that is aloof and unreachable by the laymen, not rich Jews (big bulls) who separate themselves from the less financially endowed Jews (little goats), not Kohanim who separate themselves from the Jewish people. Hashem grants us atonement when we are forgiving to one another, when we see ourselves as mixed and one lot, as the Sages tell us (Safra, Leviticus 26:37) “All of Israel is Aravin Zeh Bazeh” which can meet is responsible for one another, but literally translates as mixed on in the other.
Interestingly, the mixed bloods, that incredibly unique service only done on Yom Kippur is applied on the Golden Altar. The Sages tell us that the Golden Altar provides atonement for the sin of Lashon Hara, of gossip and hurtful words. Maybe this is a hint to the idea that what most often causes divisions between Jews is our words, and therefore it was specifically on the vessel that atones for hurtful words that we apply the service that represents our desire to be fully mixed into one another. May we focus this week on being more mixed with our fellow Jews of all stripes and backgrounds, may we focus on removing hurtful and divisive words from our language, and in that way may we merit full atonement, and the coming of the Moshiach!
Parsha Summary
This weeks parsha, Achrei Mos starts of with Ha-shem telling Moses the proper way for the Kohen Gadol (High Priest) to enter the Holy of Holies which is only done on Yom Kippur. This commandment was given after Aaron’s two eldest sons died after entering the Holy at an improper time. The lesson is that Holiness requires preparation and cannot be jumped into off the cuff, and the Holier the place, the more groundwork required. Everyone understands that it would be foolish to buy a house without checking it out properly first, or sign a contract without going over the details, all the more so in the spiritual world whose effects are more far-reaching do we have to prepare properly before rushing in.
The Torah describes the Yom Kippur service in detail but one interesting item to note is that the Kohen Gadol first brings a sacrifice to atone for his personal and his families sins, then a sacrifice to atone for all the Kohanim (his tribe), and only after that does he bring an offering to a atone for the entire Jewish community. This is very much in synch with the concept of preparation mentioned above, in that one before trying to change the world must first change himself and then work outward in concentric circles personal-family-tribe-community at large.
The Torah then discusses the prohibition against bringing sacrifices outside of the Temple or eating their parts out of their boundaries. (Yep, in case you didn’t pick up on it, this is also about showing respect for the act of sacrifice and understanding that you can’t just sacrifice it anywhere or anytime that you feel like it, there is a system that you must follow. So if you have that Tyco altar in your backyard, its time to fold it up, and wait for the Messiah when we will have a real Temple again!)
Then the Torah mentions the prohibition of eating blood. The blood is considered to be the seat of the soul of the animal hence we offer it on the altar, as a sign that we want one soul to be offered to atone for another, and therefore it would be profane to eat it in any other medium. (I know this week is a tough one, you have to fold up the Tyco altar, and stop your membership with the Vampires R Us club.)
In fact the Talmud learns a great lesson from this. If we get reward for not eating blood or other forbidden insects that one naturally loathes, how much greater is our reward for holding ourselves back from doing things that we are attracted to! This is why the forbidden relationships juxtaposed to this topic in this same Parsha to help us realize this lesson.
Here the Torah also commands us to cover the blood of non-domesticated animals or birds that we slaughter. The reason for this is that if the blood contains the soul of the animal it would be improper to eat the animal while its lifeblood and soul are lying exposed on the ground. This shows two things. One, that even animals have some sort of soul, as do even plants and rocks each to a lesser extent, as everything is an emanation from G-d and to exist must have some sort of soul or life to it. This is evidenced by Psalms talking about how different inanimate objects sing the praises of G-d, which is not just a metaphor. (Now we begin to understand the crazy Pet Rock fad of the 70’s!) Another lesson is the incredible sensitivity the Torah displays even toward animals, how much more so must we be sensitive to people’s feelings.
After this the Torah enumerates many of the forbidden sexual relationships including adultery, incest, homosexuality, and bestiality. Right after this the Torah write a warning not to commit certain forms of idol worship. The juxtaposition is explained as follows; both the idol worshipper and the person committing adultery are being treacherous to one who deserves their loyalty, whether it be G-d or one’s spouse.
At the end of the parsha the Torah enjoins us not to commit these immoral acts, as they were the cause that the dwellers of Canaan (Israel) to be expelled from it. If we contaminate ourselves with them, we will also be banished from our land as the Holy Land itself has holiness and it can’t contain impurity. This concludes the Parsha, and now we have come full circle because the same concept of preparation and respect we see applying to the Holy Land as it does to the Holy of Holies that the Kohen Gadol enters on Yom Kippur! That’s all Folks!
Quote of the Week: Every thing you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear. – George Addair
Random Fact of the Week: There are more than 10 million bricks in the Empire State Building.
Funny Line of the Week: I’m not superstitious, but I’m a little stitious.
Have a Stupendous Shabbos,
R’ Leiby Burnham
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