Kosher USA: How Coke Became Kosher and Other Tales of Modern Foods

Kosher USA: How Coke Became Kosher and Other Tales of Modern Foods. By Roger Horowitz. New York: Columbia University Press, 2016. 320 pp.

Starting as a niche segment of the American food industry, kosher food has become ubiquitous, with more than 70,000 products certified as kosher and close to 15 billion dollar business in annual sales. How kosher food became such a major segment of the marketplace is the subject of Roger Horowitz's engaging book Kosher USA. Horowitz explores how an ancient set of rituals governing food consumption among Jews was transformed by modern science through the fascinating story of how everyday foodstuffs like Coca-Cola (which contains glycerin), Jell-O (which contains gelatin), and Oreos (which originally contained lard) succeeded in becoming kosher, frequently over the vociferous objections of Orthodox rabbis for whom ingredients derived from non-kosher animals were patently unacceptable.

Just as departments and interdisciplinary programs in Food Studies have sprouted up in colleges and universities throughout the country, the study of Jewish food has mushroomed. Hasia Diner's seminal Hungering for America (2008) spawned a spate of academic books on the history of particular Jewish foods, including Maria Balinska's The Bagel (2009), Laura Silver's Knish (2014), and my own Pastrami on Rye (2015). Gefilte fish, pickles, and rugelach await their chroniclers. At the same time, economic history has been its own gold mine for Jewish studies, with many exemplary works, such as Adam Mendelsohn's award-winning book on the rise of the clothing business, The Rag Race: How Jews Sewed Their Way to...