Robert Friedman

Owner

N/A

Robariah Farms

State: MA

(w) (413) 835-5205

About

Robert Friedman is the owner and Project Leader of Robariah Farms, a kosher-certified (OU glatt), pasture-raised livestock farm in Deerfield, Massachusetts. He has built Robariah Farms into the only regenerative, kosher-certified farm of its kind in New England, raising pasture-raised poultry and eggs and now expanding into lamb and beef.

Robert's work on local kosher meat processing spans over a decade. He was Project Leader on two prior Northeast SARE Farmer Grants (FNE15-827 and FNE19-929), which researched the production efficiency and cost-effectiveness of local kosher poultry processing compared to industrial kosher facilities, work that has shaped how small-scale kosher poultry processing is understood across the region.

In addition to his farming and research background, Robert is a certified kosher ritual slaughterer (shochet), holding a kabbalah issued by Rabbi Shlomo Zacharow of the Sacred Slaughter Institute for Shechita Studies, with training specific to ruminant slaughter. He performs and oversees on-farm kosher slaughter for Robariah Farms' own lambs and, increasingly, for other New England farms that have begun approaching him directly for this service. He consults with Meatworks, a USDA-inspected processing facility in Westport, Massachusetts, on the kosher processing standards and HACCP requirements needed to support its expansion into kosher ruminant processing.

Robert brings this combination of farm ownership, applied research experience, and hands-on kosher slaughter expertise to this project, positioning him to both carry out the pilot processing days and translate the results into practical guidance for other regional farmers.