Food Laws

In the Torah there are commandments about food and what is suitable for Jewish consumption. These are the Laws of Kashrut. Kosher food is fit for Jews to eat. The meat from certain animals is forbidden to Jews, and the blood of any animal must never be consumed. Therefore, animals, which Jews may eat, have to be slaughtered in a special way to ensure that most of the blood is drained from them. The meat then has to be soaked, covered in salt for a while then rinsed to draw any further blood out of it. Then it has to be well cooked. The rules on which animals are fit for Jewish people and which are not are as follows:

Type of animal	Kosher (fit)	Treifa (Unfit)
Mammals	Animals which have a hoof divided into two parts AND which also chew the cud (ruminating animals). e.g. beef, lamb, venison, goat are acceptable meats.	Any animal which fails to meet EITHER requirement e.g. pigs, horses, camels, rabbits etc.
Birds	Birds which are not birds of prey or carrion birds (and their eggs). e.g chicken, turkey, doves	Birds which are birds of prey or carrion birds. e.g. ravens, eagles, hawks etc.
Water Creatures	Water creatures must have both fins and scales. e.g. cod, trout etc.	Any water creature that lacks either fins or scales. e.g. eels, shellfish, crab, lobster, prawns, shrimps, squid, shark, dogfish etc.

Meat and Dairy Produce

There is a further, important rule: meat and dairy produce must never be mixed. Not only must they not be cooked or eaten together, the same utensils, equipment, cutlery, crockery and so on, must not be used for meat and dairy produce. Consequently, Jewish kitchens are divided, to a greater or lesser extent (depending on the financial ability of the family, to keep the two apart. Most wil have two sinks and draining boards, two separate sets of cupboards, cutlery and crockery. Others will have two cookers, two dishwashers, two microwaves and so on. Frequently items will be colour coded to ensure there is no confusion - e.g. red for meat and blue for dairy produce. A further category of food - parev - covers foodstuffs such as vegetables which can be eaten with either meat or milk. For the purpose of this law, fish does not count as meat.