By COLlive reporter
After the decadent chocolate dessert, you can have even more.
Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble is unveiling Crest Be, a new mint chocolate toothpaste promising “a whole new world of deliciousness for toothbrushes everywhere.”
It is one of three new ones –“Vanilla Mint Spark” and “Lime Spearmint Zest” are the other two– that is being introduced by the No. 2 oral care brand in the world with 20% market share behind Colgate.
“Got an adventurous spirit or a sweet tooth?” asks Crest in a release about the product. “Well, then this is the toothpaste for you. Now consumers can explore outside their boundaries, arouse their senses and energize their brushing routine like never before.”
Rabbi Don Yoel Levy, CEO of OK Kosher, one of the largest kosher supervision agencies in the world, said the new flavor does not pose any new dietary halachic questions.
“There is no difference between this toothpaste and other toothpastes besides the flavor,” he told in response to an inquiry by COLlive.com. “Some people will only use toothpaste with a hechsher, others not as you do not swallow it.”
Indeed, John Scarchilli, head of Scientific Communications for Proctor & Gamble, said the new Trek toothpaste contains chocolate flavoring only.
It owes its tooth-protecting properties to sodium fluoride — the same ingredient found in original Crest and many another toothpaste, he said.
While there are kosher certified toothpastes out there, the Chicago Rabbinical Council (CRC) has written in the past questioning they need.
“There are some Rabbis who hold that no matter how hard the companies try to make toothpaste palatable — because it’s used in a place where we have all our taste buds — it is never considered a food since the definition of food according to Jewish Law is something that one eats and would feed to others. Since you’d never consider feeding someone a toothpaste-like food for lunch, it’s considered inedible and doesn’t require kosher certification.”
Crest’s Mint Chocolate Trek will be available the first week in February at drugstores and mass retailers nationwide and will retail for $4.99.
Great lets brush our teeth with real chocolate!!!!! Yum
It seems like children will want to taste the chocolate toothpaste. To me, it sounds like a sakana, after all, the toothpaste packages say that it is dangerous to swallow more than a pea size and as we all know, the Torah prohibits one to have danger in one’s house. Why put such a temptation to children?
Do you brush your teeth with food and swollow it afterwards?CORRECTION:junk
The amount of people who have shocking fluro teeth need not worry about all the above JUST BRUSH YOUR TEETH.
no offense but thats ridiculous, no one is going to start snacking on toothpaste now
Never mind the flavor, fluoride is awful for you. Why do you think you aren’t supposed to swallow it?
Studies have also shown no difference in preventing cavities from those who use it to those who don’t. My family isn’t used fluoride toothpaste in years, and ba’h there have been no cavities.
Learn the whole sugya before offering an opinion. The quoted tzemach Tzedek is talking about inedible soap and only ppermits it because it tastes bad. The general consensus is that the issur is hanoah of tasting, not only eating that is ossur.
If you must rely on the kula do so by all means but don’t mock those who follow the main conclusion of poskim in order to justify yourself. Also, don’t slander the previous generation which I witnessed who by and large went through great lengths to avoid toothpaste which contained tarfos albeit without a hechsher.
You can look in Rabbi Blumenkrantz o”h’s book and he writes there which brands contain animal ingredients and which not.
So we should start brushing our teeth with “other junk”? If people are brushing there teeth with toothpaste that’s what they will swallow while they are brushing their teeth. After all who eats “junk” while they are brushing their teeth?
So is there a hechshure or not?
Please call the CRC and challenge them:
The article writes “While there are kosher certified toothpastes out there, the Chicago Rabbinical Council (CRC) has written in the past questioning the need.”
The Mechaber is talking about FOOD, versus here: the definition of food according to Jewish Law is something that one eats and would feed to others. Since you’d never consider feeding someone a toothpaste-like food for lunch, it’s considered inedible and doesn’t require kosher certification.
And just so you know, the people the age of your grandparents or parents (depending how old you are) used toothpaste BEFORE any had a hechsher. The reason: Chumra of the Week Club was not yet invented. Why? Because some of them really knew how to learn.
green ketchup and clear pepsi!! i bet you this will end the same!
There is much better junk out there to swallow than toothpaste!!!
KIDS DO EAT TOOTHPASTE !!
What? Huh? But I’ve been doing that all my life….
Toothpaste is not meant to be swallowed. That is also why aluminum foil does not need to have a hechsher, not plastic ziploc bags. if they came out with chocolate aluminum foil, I am sure someone will ask if it needs a hechsher.
Have you seen the difference in price between a name brand toothpaste and a ‘Kosher’ brand toothpaste? enough said
I’m glad we can use the product!
This seems like it will be lots of fun! So creative 🙂
like my teeth will feel too clean using this
Heard on Rabbis Berl Baumgarten name that he said in the Frierdike Rebbe’s name that the pgam is very small when using non kosher toothpaste.
you are not suppose to swallow toothpaste.
There’s a shakla v’tario about that in the very beginning of hilchos taaruvos. The argument to assur it is very compelling: if one is permitted to taste without swallowing why does even the mechaber who allows a goy to taste something that a non-kosher ingredient has fallen into there (instead of bittul bshishim) go through such lengths to believe a goy- just have a yid taste it and spit it out…? Also see the famous tzemach Tzedek there (not ours) with the soap story. The punchline there is that it is okay because it tastes bad which cannot be said… Read more »
sorry i think its saying like its ok try it as chassidim we should go beyond the flavor we should have a hechsher for toothpaste especially if now it tastes good we might want to swallow it
um gross?
BS”D
with all due respect Rav Marlow Olev Hasholem told me that toothpaste must have a hecksher