Most strain names come from a grower with a sense of humor or a marketing meeting with a deadline. Kosher Kush came from Los Angeles, arrived without much of a paper trail, and then collected more hardware than almost anything else in its era. Monday flagship: the strain that showed up quiet and left with the trophies.
A clone with no birth certificate
Kosher Kush started life the way a lot of California legends did, as a clone-only cut passed hand to hand around Los Angeles. No seed release, no breeder announcement, no origin story anyone could verify. It circulated under a few different names before the one that stuck.
Reserva Privada, a division of DNA Genetics, is the outfit generally credited with putting it into seed form and giving it a stable identity. Its parentage is reported to run back to OG Kush, which fits everything about the way it smells. What happened in between is mostly lore, and the honest answer is that nobody has fully reconstructed it.
About the name
The story that follows this strain everywhere is that it became the first commercial cannabis strain on record to be blessed by a rabbi. It is repeated in nearly every write-up, it is where the name comes from, and it is also the kind of claim that lives in cannabis culture rather than in any archive. Treat it as reported rather than documented and it is still a good story.
What is documented is the competition record. Kosher Kush took Best Indica at the High Times Cannabis Cup in both 2010 and 2011, and Best Strain outright in 2011. Back-to-back category wins plus the overall title is not a fluke, and it is the reason a clone with no pedigree ended up on every menu in the state.
What it smells like
Rich earth first, then fruit. That combination is unusual and it is the whole signature. Reviewers reliably land on the same handful of notes: damp soil, pine, a berry sweetness underneath, citrus at the edges, and a spice that shows up late.
Lab profiles typically put myrcene, limonene, and caryophyllene at the top. That is a sensible reading of what your nose reports. Myrcene brings the earthy fruit depth, limonene supplies the citrus lift, and caryophyllene lays the peppery, woody foundation the whole thing sits on. It is also, by wide agreement, one of the loudest of the OG-related profiles. People who like it do not like it quietly.
In cannabis culture it built an Evening reputation, the kind of strain fans reached for when the day was already done. Cozy is the word that fits it best.
The chew
Raspberry Relief is our Kosher Kush, and the pairing choice was almost made for us. That earthy-fruit signature already points at berries, so we ran toward it with red raspberry candy flavor instead of trying to soften the earthiness out of the profile. The raspberry brightens the fruit that is already there and lets the pine and spice sit underneath where they belong.
Authentic hemp-derived terpenes, zero THC, zero CBD, tested by a DEA-registered lab batch by batch. It is one of the more grown-up flavors in the lineup, and it converts people who thought they did not like earthy profiles.
Fast facts
- Origin: clone-only cut out of Los Angeles
- Put into seed form by: Reserva Privada, a division of DNA Genetics
- Reported lineage: OG Kush family
- Also known as: Kosher OG
- Awards: High Times Cannabis Cup Best Indica 2010 and 2011, Best Strain 2011
- Signature notes: earth, pine, berry, citrus, late spice
- In the MONDAYS lineup: Raspberry Relief, paired with red raspberry
Full profile on the Kosher Kush page. If the Evening end of the shelf is where you live, start with the indica-leaning collection, or browse everything in the Strain Library.
See you next Monday.
