Random Kosher Questions

[jackal10]

But that is just the point. Are you saying you have to accept the whole lot or nothing?

Tofutti Ice Cream with Lamb is contrary to "marit ayin" (and good taste), just as drinking cola in McD is.

Edited January 8, 2007 by jackal10 (log)

[Gifted Gourmet]

Just a brief note about the concept mentioned in this thread, namely "marit ayin" ... how things appear:

When a religious Jew goes into a McDonald's in America -- and I do not care how observant the person is -- no one will think that the McDonalds is really kosher; rather they might think that this person is not really as observant as he appears.

That is a case of chashad. When a religious person goes into a "kosherstyle" restaurant, which appears to be kosher, but actually is not, the watcher might think that this restaurant really is kosher and eat in it himself. That is marit ayin.... and this comes from Rabbi Michael Broyde of Young Israel orthodox synagogue here in Atlanta ....

As far as Jewish jokes go, they offer little to help explicate what is actually a serious question posed here initially ...

Edited January 8, 2007 by Gifted Gourmet (log)

[Fat Guy]

But that is just the point.  Are you saying you have to accept the whole lot or nothing?

Tofutti Ice Cream with Lamb is contrary to "marit ayin" (and good taste), just as drinking cola in McD is.

←

You can accept whatever you like. I accept none of it. But that doesn't change what it means. The basic definitions of the kosher dietary laws belong to the few who keep those laws. Once we're in that range of possibilities, sure, there's room for differentiation. But I'm aware of no permutation of the law that says it's unkosher to eat Tofutti ice cream with lamb because Tofutti ice cream is an imitation of a dairy product. And if there is such an interpretation out there somewhere, I'd say it fails on the law's own terms -- not because I don't believe in it, or because everybody gets to decide for himself, but rather because there is a body of law we can look at to evaluate a new claim like that. Moreover, "marit ayin" is neither part of the dietary laws nor a property of food. Were it to apply at all, it still wouldn't apply to someone sitting home alone eating a Tofutti ice cream and lamb sundae in front of the TV, so it's not about the kosherness of the food -- it's a separate issue.

[Pam R]

While the tofutti ice cream involves the same issue, I think we'd be better off talking about items that would actually be used together.

An everyday occurrence in Jewish homes (orthodox or not) around the world would be parve margarine (coffee creamer, sour cream, etc.) used and served with a meat meal.

I don't personally know of any orthodox Jews who won't eat parve margarine or use coffee creamer - unless they don't want to eat the product itself - but not because of kashrut.

[Gifted Gourmet]

I don't personally know of any orthodox Jews who won't eat parve margarine or use coffee creamer - unless they don't want to eat the product itself - but not because of kashrut.

←

but some will keep the Coffee Rich (just one commercial example of the product we are discussing here) container on the table to show that it is not milk being used .. this, then, is also under the category of marit ayin, how things appear ...

[jackal10]

Oxtail is another case. My mother remembers it as kosher in her youth, before the Rabbonim changed their minds, or rather decided that the buthcers were not skilled enough to remove the forbidden sciatic nerve;

Oxtail is to be regretted since its nowhere near the forbidden parts, but comes under the general hindquarters ban.

See, for example http://oukosher.org/index.php/articles/single/6550/

[Gifted Gourmet]

comes under the general hindquarters ban.

←

which destroyed my love of making roast leg of lamb ... this way of life is not without some personal sacrifice ... simply depends upon what values one holds dear ...

[Swisskaese]

I am not crazy about fake bacon, shrimp, calamari, etc. Not because they should not be available, but because I think they taste nasty.

Kosher cooks through the ages have always tried to find good substitutes for non-Kosher dishes. For example, when a recipe calls for bacon, most of us use smoked goose. It gives the dish that smoky flavour that is found in dishes calling for bacon.

I think that those who do not keep Kosher always make a big deal about keeping Kosher. It is really not a big deal. I don't really miss the seafood anymore.

I do not like non-dairy products and avoid them at all costs. I only serve non-dairy creamer to guests. And, I refuse to make desserts with parve cream. I will make cakes or tartes with oil or margarine.

[moosnsqrl]

Soy Pepperoni:  Now You Can Have Your Treyf and Eat It Too

←

Actually, Fress, don't knock it until you try it. During my 14 meatless years I became very fond of it and still use it rather than run-of-the-mill grocery store pepperoni. If I have the good stuff, I'll go with it. The generic isn't worth the oil slick it creates on the top of a pie, so I'll go with the Yves if it's available.

On that note, I think much of the marketing of faux foods in shapes is just that - marketing. They make the foods for vegetarians or people with allergies anyway, so they look around and wonder how they can expand the market. If they're making surimi anyway, why not sell it to kosher-keeping (or some slice thereof) Jews as kosher crab?

[Fat Guy]

I think a fundamental question here is whether the kosher dietary laws are literal or symbolic. To take this to the logical extreme, skip forward to a science fiction scenario where all our food is created out of lab-grown protein or whatever. At that point, there's a choice to be made: either the kosher dietary laws are no longer relevant, or we have to avoid putting lab-grown protein that looks like dairy on the same plate as lab-grown protein that looks like meat.

[Pan]

I think a fundamental question here is whether the kosher dietary laws are literal or symbolic. To take this to the logical extreme, skip forward to a science fiction scenario where all our food is created out of lab-grown protein or whatever. At that point, there's a choice to be made: either the kosher dietary laws are no longer relevant, or we have to avoid putting lab-grown protein that looks like dairy on the same plate as lab-grown protein that looks like meat.

←

No way will it be that simple. That new situation will give rise to all kinds of learned commentary and debate among rabbinic authorities.

[cakewalk]

I think a fundamental question here is whether the kosher dietary laws are literal or symbolic. To take this to the logical extreme, skip forward to a science fiction scenario where all our food is created out of lab-grown protein or whatever. At that point, there's a choice to be made: either the kosher dietary laws are no longer relevant, or we have to avoid putting lab-grown protein that looks like dairy on the same plate as lab-grown protein that looks like meat.

←

No way will it be that simple. That new situation will give rise to all kinds of learned commentary and debate among rabbinic authorities.

←

Bingo!

Not only that, but such a situation would not come about suddenly, it would most likely be a gradual process so there would be some laws already that would guide the commentary towards a conclusion (or, more likely, several conclusions.) This stuff is usually a process, including both an utter change in food source and the related laws on how/whether to eat it.

[Gifted Gourmet]

lab-grown protein

←

and then there is this: according to the rigid regulations of shechita (pronounced sheh-KHEE-taw), Hebrew for slaughtering .. there are literally hundreds of laws governing shechitah ... who will be the shochet and what will their union do when there is no longer a need for this ritual?

[jackal10]

I think that is a good question that Steven poses, and cenral to the debate.

For the specific case, there is an answer.

If the cell line is derived from animal, then its meat, if from vegetable or microbial or fungal (like Quorn or Tofu), then its parev, unless the form and circumstance might confuse.

However there is a doctirne that says if it goes through a stage that is unfit for a dog to eat, then it becomes stops being food and becomes parev.

[Miriam Kresh]

Out of curiosity, I picked up a package of kosher shrimp in the supermarket, gave it a whirl, and found that it didn't match my memories of the taste of shrimp. (It was expensive, too.) It was OK, not repulsive to me in itself. If it were served in someone else's home or at some event, I'd probably eat it, if only to be polite. But it made me uneasy, and I had to sit down and figure it out.

What I found disturbing about kosher treif food is the feeling that eating it doesn't jive with the way I see myself, as an Orthodox Jew. My decision to keep kosher didn't come easy, and for years, it took considerable willpower to stay away from treif foods I used to love. (It's different now; Orthodox kashrut is a comfortable given in my life.) There is something else - I also dislike the feeling that someone with an eye on my money wants to wake up feelings of greed in me: for faux treif. Why that? I chose to leave that culture. I don't feel a need to hark back to it. I dislike respresenting the target market for such food. Now, it's legitimate to ask if in that case I resent ads that wake up a thirst for Coke, or a hunger for French fries - two things I love and rarely consume for health reasons - and to that I would answer, no. Those products don't imply what fake shrimp implies, for me anyway: a taste of the forbidden, covered in kashrut. For a person who was born into a religious home and has never tasted treif, I suppose it might be different, I don't know.

Eating the kosher shrimp certainly did not imperil my soul - it was kosher with a hechsher (stamp of kashrut). I do feel, though, that to delight in it would be a spiritual step backwards for me.

Miriam

[Gifted Gourmet]

I do feel, though, that to delight in it would be a spiritual step backwards for me.

←

this reminds me of a story, possibly one of those about Reb Zusha .. something to the effect that if there is nothing at all to eat, it is permissible to eat a treif meaty rib bone but one "need not suck the bones" ... sound familiar? pikuach nefesh, the responsibility we have to remain alive above all else, but don't take pleasure in eating treif meat, even if it is all there is left to eat ... I recall the story in general but not the specifics ...

ah, I located the item that I am trying to explain:

Once the Chafetz Chaim was asked what one should do if he was taken by force into the Czar's army in Russia and has no choice, if he wants to stay alive, but to eat from the non-kosher food. The Chafetz Chaim told him he may eat, being this is "pikuach nefesh" - a matter of life and death - but, said the Chafetz Chaim: Just don’t suck the bones. Don’t enjoy it! Eat because you have to live, but don’t suck the bones. How true are the words of the Chafetz Chaim!

the proper source Edited January 9, 2007 by Gifted Gourmet (log)

[Miriam Kresh]

Yes, Melissa, I know that story, and it's germaine to the discussion. There is another I heard, from the grandson of the person involved, a concentration camp survivor. He said that his grandmother would never touch sausage, and could hardly tolerate it in the house. He asked her why, since no treif was kept in their house and all sausage in it was kosher. She told him this: when she was in the camps as a teenager, the Nazis would sometimes give out sausage meat for the one daily meal. She used to love sausage in her former free life, and would long to eat this treif stuff. There was little enough to eat anyway. But she would refrain, because she reasoned that "It was bad enough I had to eat treif to survive. I didn't want to start enjoying it, too." After she regained her freedom, she could never bear to see sausage again, for it brought back horrible memories of starvation.

She made a hard choice back then, and stuck to it. I honestly don't know if I would have done the same if I were starving. But this is the spirit that I feel when looking at that kosher shrimp. So my contribution to this discussion comes back to "the spirit of the law"; my own interpretation. I don't need to eat kosher shrimp to survive, for which I am soberly grateful.

Miriam

Edited January 10, 2007 by Miriam Kresh (log)

[Fat Guy]

I was searching on the Orthodox Union website today and saw that there are about twenty imitation bacon products certified kosher by them. I mean, there's everything from "Quaker Instant Grits-Country Bacon w/Imitation Bacon Bits #394" to "Old London Bacon Melba Rounds" to more than a dozen different brands of imitation bacon bits. And these Orthodox Union people are, well, they're orthodox for sure, and in my experience their certification is considered definitive by the broadest spectrum of the orthodox community. So if they're saying all this fake bacon stuff is perfectly kosher, I don't understand how the spirit of the law enters into it. If there is a spirit of the law -- if that's even relevant to Judaism -- the Orthodox Union surely has thought about it and concluded that the spirit of the law has no problem with imitation bacon. And if there's no problem with imitation bacon, what could possibly be the problem with any other simulated product? Bacon is the thing, the most identifiable, big-deal unkosher thing. It's what everybody knows isn't kosher. I'm not observant at all, but even were I to wake up tomorrow and decide to become an observant Jew I don't think under any circumstances I'd feel the need to be more orthodox than the Orthodox Union.

[rtrunk]

Here the principle may be "eat only wholesome food", so you could argue that pork is OK, now that ther is little threat of trichinosis but beef, with the modern threat of CJD is not.

←

As an aside, the "conventional" view that the prohibition on eating pork is due to hygiene/health reasons just doesn't hold water.

Consider:

1. The symptoms of trichinellosis (at least in the early stages) are the same for lots of other common diseases (colds, flu, etc). I find it hard to believe that ancient jews could easily distinguish one from the other.

2. There are a gazillion food-borne parasites that they would have had to deal with. Beef, chicken, goat, and even fruits and vegetables carry 'em. I doubt that pork would be singled out as a carrier of disease.

3. One has to explain what the health reasons for all the other prohibitions are. Why can one eat a duck but not a swan? Why only fish with scales? Why a goat but not a camel?

4. Like most parasites, they are easily killed by cooking meat thoroughly. All God would have needed to say is "Thou shalt cook thy meat until it is well done."

5. To me the most compelling argument is that while some may like to think that the ancient jews were particularly clever (or had divine assistance), so were the Egyptians, Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, etc. Don't you think they would notice some relationship with eating pork and getting sick?

I think the laws of Kashrut are matters of ritual or ethnic purity, and have nothing to do with health. It is just an attempt by modern folks to find a rational or scientific explanation for something that is ultimately a spiritual matter.

[Pam R]

I'm not observant at all, but even were I to wake up tomorrow and decide to become an observant Jew I don't think under any circumstances I'd feel the need to be more orthodox than the Orthodox Union.

←

I couldn't agree with you more - but of course, there are others who don't.

A couple of years ago I was doing a cooking demo in Toronto to promote my cookbook. It was at a large grocery store that had a massive kosher section with a kosher butcher and a kitchen where they were preparing kosher foods. The place was under the supervision of COR - Canada's most prevalent hechsher.

An employee was given a shopping list for me and gathered everything together. It was the first demo in their kosher teaching kitchen - so they didn't even have salt and pepper. The rabbi arrived and was going through everything and didn't like one of the products. I can't remember what it was, but I remember looking at the label and saying something like "It's under OU - how can it not be acceptable??". He wouldn't let me use it - we had to find an alternative.

There will always be groups who don't accept certain hechshers - even OU. There are few people who won't buy COR here (in Winnipeg) - but there is still a group who would prefer it if I brought my chicken in from Montreal (under Montreal Kosher) than from Toronto. And some who won't buy any chicken unless it's slaughtered under Lubavitch supervision.

[Gifted Gourmet]

There will always be groups who don't accept certain hechshers - even OU.  There are few people who won't buy COR here (in Winnipeg) - but there is still a group who would prefer it if I brought my chicken in from Montreal (under Montreal Kosher) than from Toronto.  And some who won't buy any chicken unless it's slaughtered under Lubavitch supervision.

←

Isn't that what makes the Jews the "chosen people"? We have so many options from which to choose .. and then there is the "whose home is acceptably kosher to you?" ... not easy .. not at all ...

[jackal10]

What is sad is that the heckscher appears sometimes to be political, and can at times be given or witheld depending on the payment of a large fee...

[Pam R]

Jack, I wouldn't say sometimes. It's very political and very costly.

[Miriam Kresh]

So if they're saying all this fake bacon stuff is perfectly kosher, I don't understand how the spirit of the law enters into it. If there is a spirit of the law -- if that's even relevant to Judaism -- the Orthodox Union surely has thought about it and concluded that the spirit of the law has no problem with imitation bacon. And if there's no problem with imitation bacon, what could possibly be the problem with any other simulated product? Bacon is the thing, the most identifiable, big-deal unkosher thing. It's what everybody knows isn't kosher. I'm not observant at all, but even were I to wake up tomorrow and decide to become an observant Jew I don't think under any circumstances I'd feel the need to be more orthodox than the Orthodox Union.

←

Steve,

Interesting about the quantity of imitation bacon products certified by the OU. This must be an American thing; I have never seen them in markets here in Israel. Speciality stores featuring American condiments and cuts of meat probably do, though. I just shop in the neighborhood and the shuk. When people want treif, they go to the Russian makolets, where the real thing is available. I don't know how the average Israeli would regard imitation bacon; most, I believe, would just say, "what for?".

It looks to me like kosher certification is given to foods when kosher-keeping consumers start demanding them. Or does the creation of a new product and its advertising create the demand? Either way, my feeling about "kosher treif" is part of my personal journey; no intention of being holier than thou, or the Orthodox Union, or my neighbor browsing the frozen food aisle in the supermarket. Perhaps my way of thinking is different from the mainstream American-Jewish way, as I've lived for close to 40 years outside the States. I'm certainly not here to judge anyone's desire to eat anything - what would I be doing on a multi-faceted forum such as this if so? I simply prefer not to bring fake shrimp or bacon, because of their associations, into my home.

Miriam

[Pam R]

A market we haven't really discussed for kosher imitation items, but one I see all the time, is the newly religious and those that have converted.

These are people who embrace kashrut more than they did in their past lives and don't want to give up what they've always enjoyed. Now, the imitation items don't generally taste like the real thing (I mean, really) - but they taste enough like the real thing that people will settle for them.