I've been up in the Pacific Northwest for a little over 9 years now, and in all that time there have been two foods I could get in Los Angeles that I just can't seem to get here: truly good pastrami and Wilno Kosher salami. I still hold out hope for good pastrami, but this morning my hopes for Wilno Kosher salami were dashed as I found out it will cease production "on or before January 30, 2009."

Wilno is a brand I grew up with. My sister and I both started out teething on chunks of dried Wilno. My dad and his parents would often have one hanging and drying in their kitchens. I actually have a Wilno Kosher salami hanging in my kitchen right now. My father brought me one as a congratulatory gift when he came up to see the new baby. Imagine trying to get a 5 pound salami through airport security and you'll know how much my father cares.

Every once in a while, I'd get a bug and see if I could find a local distributor or seller of Wilno Kosher products, possibly one far off who offered them by mail order, but all I could find online were rumors and dead ends.

Since Wilno Kosher is a trademark of the Sara Lee company, even though they've never listed it on their web site, I decided to try calling Sara Lee's consumer hotline. They told me that what ended up on the site was a decision made by marketing, but it didn't really matter. They said that a few weeks ago they announced that they would be shutting down their kosher meats division, shuttering Best's Kosher, Sinai Kosher, Shofar, and Wilno as of January 30th. You can read the November 19th press release for full details.

I'll admit I panicked. I got angry. I asked the representative why Sara Lee hates Jews? I regret it now, but I was in shock. It's been bad enough that Wilno Kosher was hard to come by. But come January 30th, it will close its doors.

I called my dad and told him to stockpile Wilno Kosher. He told me to call them back and ask if the salamis could be frozen. But unless we rent a commercial freezer and fill it to the gills with salami, we'll run out eventually. Stockpiling it would only be a delaying tactic.

I can only hope that someone will buy the brand from Sara Lee and bring it back unchanged. But in today's environment, where health concerns and economic concerns are constricting the market for a premium kosher salami, I don't see it happening soon. While the press release said Sara Lee plans to put the meat processing plant (facility and property) up for sale, it said they were decommissioning the equipment and made no mention of seeking a buyer for the brands.

I'm heartbroken.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 8th, 2008 at 11:41 am and is filed under Cooking & Recipes, Just Personal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.