Comments on: Should Wow Mix Really Be Kosher?

By: susan g

susan g — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 04:59:53 +0000

To completely avoid consuming bugs, we’d have to stop breathing.

By: Karen

Karen — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 15:52:58 +0000

I was turned off of totally keeping Kosher by the comments by the Kosher Inspectors at the meat processing plant saying that they only thing they cared about was how the animals were killed. They were not responsible for how the animals were treated before they were killed, how the workers are treated, and whether or not there were underage workers there. Really, those parts don’t matter as long as an animal was killed “correctly,” and that follows Jewish ethics? Sounds like priorities have been misplaced somewhere along the line.

By: Alix

Alix — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:48:23 +0000

As if I needed more reasons NOT to keep kosher; Rachel, I agree with you, but didn’t know about the strawberries and figs. While I knew the laws about bugs, it didn’t cross my mind when I put brussels sprouts on the menu for the 2008 Hazon Food Conference. We got them donated, organic, from a local farm, and they never made it to the plate because the rabbis deemed them unkosher. Broccoli and cauliflower are not allowed, either. In talking about this, one exec committee member said that his local vaad is basically allowing carrots and potatoes to be served at kosher events, that’s about it; otherwise all vegetables have to be processed somehow. And I heard about how asparagus was taken off the menu at JTS. All of this makes me crazy. Fresh fruits and veggies were supposed to be the one thing that didn’t need a hechsher, but now apparently they do.

By: gershon

gershon — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:28:44 +0000

AN excellent article, Nadya, but I would be surprised it it was less than excellent, coming from you. I could make so many comments, and will at a future date, but for now will cite a poem I wrote less than three years ago. It’s still valid, I think, like the far more ancient laws of kashrut. Kashrut, like my poetry, is not to everyone’s tste, but, like my poetry, a tste that once acquired can be extremely satisfying. There you are, Nadya. I typically make sure that I become the center of every discussion, and have even managed to do so after reading your delightful article. With readers like me, perhaps you are better of being ignored.

NOT QUITE KOSHER

The Jews hoped they could learn how to be kosher
from two small tablets or a little brochure,
but God, believing them to be far needier,
gave Moshe laws in an encyclopedia
so heavy that it took the holy chariot
to bring it down from heaven, and to carry it
was far beyond his power, so he dropped it.
That’s why its laws have rarely been adopted.
Had Moshe had a PC or a Mac
he might have brought so many of them back
that everybody would have felt it safe
to keep them, but he didn’t, so we’re treif.
I think it’s mainly God’s fault, don’t blame Moshe:
he thought the deal was that he’d get a brochure.

By: Debra

Debra — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 21:52:42 +0000

This post reminded me a post I read today about “Breastfeeding Tyrants” who impose their beliefs onto others by talking about breastfeeding and by breastfeeding in public. I found myself upset with the post because I think that all moms should have a chance to learn about breatsfeeding from their friends experiences and see breastfeeding occuring as part of normal life. But I do not think that formula should be banned- it has its time and place. Ultimately it is up to the parent to decide how they will feed their child.

And my feelings for this post are the same: we cannot be health tyrants. All we can do is educate and let people make their own decisions. That is what makes the world so interesting. Junk food might also have its time and place and similarly should not be banned.

And please keep the kosher rules what they are! They are already stricter than they need to be and blown out of proportion, don’t add to it anymore than we already have!

“Everything I command you, that is what you be careful to do; don’t add to it or subtract from it.” (Devarim 12: 30-13:1)

Or perhaps more fitting, it can also be translated as “Don’t add to them, so as not to subtract from them.”

By: Jo

Jo — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 18:47:08 +0000

The largest kosher market in my neighborhood here in Southern California sells garlic from China, and packaged, hechsered fresh mint. Bottom line for most customers is going to be either cost or rigorous kashrut supervision. Food safety (that Chinese garlic, when California garlic capitol Gilroy is nearby) is seemingly secondary. Food miles and other environmental concerns would be even further off the radar.

By: Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster

Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:56:43 +0000

I agree that keeping kosher seems to perpetuate alienation from sustainable eating. One area you see this is produce (asparagus, figs, strawberries), where we are slowly discovering smaller and smaller bugs that live in them. To some kosher-keepers, this means that certain produce has to be either avoided, heavily washed, or processed in order to be eaten. At the same time, the amount of kosher packaged food increases. Processed becomes a sign of something being clean. I think distorts what keeping kosher means.

By: Ilana

Ilana — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:08:06 +0000

I know that I’m a heathen in some ways and that to be kosher is to follow the law and not pick and choose what works for me and what doesn’t.

But…to me Kosher is about being ethical. Just like all the other Jewish laws were created and exanded upon in order to be the most fair, the most just, the most moral and let there be no question.

We don’t eat carnivores or animals with omnivorous digestive systems to ensure that we don’t eat ‘trayf’ which doesn’t mean ‘not kosher’ it means ‘to tear’ (as in to rip). We don’t ingest anything into our bodies that harms it’s food when IT eats.

Is it really in the spirit of ethical treatment of animals to consider chicken ‘fleischig’(which b/t/w can’t be ‘boiled in its mother’s milk)but it’s OK to eat milk-fed calf?

I don’t mean to change the subject here, ethical has a large base to draw from. Is it ethical to label food-stuffs that are basically harmful crap created by under-paid workers as Kosher? Are we to follow the law or the spirit of the law?