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What is Kosher?
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- Before getting into what is kosher, the bigger question is why do people keep it? There's no one answer.
- For some it's simply "I'm an observant Jew, G-d commanded it in the Torah, so I do it." For others it's "I grew up keeping kosher, and it's what I'm used to, what I'm comfortable
- with. It just feels Jewish."
- Or "What you consume matters, and eating should be a mindful experience. It makes the spiritual physical."
- Or even "It makes me part of something bigger, my Jewish community." When bringing food into the home of someone who keeps kosher, it's important to be respectful
- of their food restrictions. It's best to stick with fresh fruits or vegetables, or packaged foods that have kosher symbols
- on them. More on this later.
- So what are the rules of kosher? There are three basic rules.
- You can't eat some animals, the animals you do eat need to be slaughtered in a special way, and you can't combine milk and meat.
- Let's break that down. What animals can't you eat?
- Famously of course pork, shrimp, and shellfish, but the Torah has a long list of animals, calling some of them "clean" and some of them "unclean."
- You are what you eat. Pigs are out, cows are in.
- Chickens, ducks, turkey, salmon, tuna - also in. Next, what is kosher slaughter?
- Well, it's called shechita, and there are lots of rules on how different animals need to be butchered and prepared, which we're going to skip.
- What's important to know is that because meat needs to be prepared in a special way, there's a labeling system.
- Certifying agencies famously the O-U put their labels, their hechshers, on foods. If there's a hechsher on it, the meat, or any packaged food, is certified kosher.
- If not, it isn't. Some foods don't require hechshers, like fruits and veggies and others.
- Most food in a grocery store is not kosher. You may have to hunt around a bit for some products, or even go to a separate store to
- find things like kosher meat and wine. Finally, not combining milk and meat.
- Yes, this does mean no cheeseburgers, but it goes a bit beyond that. For instance, you can't use butter in mashed potatoes that you are serving with turkey.
- Separating milk and meat is taken so seriously, that some people wait an hour or three or even six between eating the two.
- In kashrut food gets lumped into two main categories: milk and meat. If you're invited to a kosher meal, it will either be a milk meal or a meat meal.
- A meal that has dairy, or one that has meat, not both. This is why kosher restaurants are either dairy restaurants or meat restaurants.
- Kosher kitchens at home generally have two sets of everything: dishes, pans, and sometimes, yes, even the kitchen sink.
- Food that's neither milk nor meat is called pareve. You can have that food with everything.
- Yay! These rules for kosher originally came from the Torah, which is sparse about the specifics.
- All the Torah says about milk and meat, for instance, is "you shall not boil a kid in the milk of it's mother," which some believe was in response to an ancient pagan ritual,
- where they did that. Like most Jewish commandments, mitzvot, the rest of the rules of kosher come from thousands
- of years of tradition, where people asked, "What's the deeper meaning of this passage?" So the three basic kosher laws got extrapolated and evolved into the "consensus" Jews have
- today, that by the way is still evolving. For instance, one of the debates right now is whether to include ethical labor practices
- inside the kosher conversation. Kosher standards vary by community.
- They look different in a Tel Aviv hotel and your grandma's kitchen, but the main motivation, making conscious holy choices every day, remains the same.
- And these shared kosher standards help to bring communities closer through everything from potlucks to shiva calls to shabbat dinners.
- If you're exploring Judaism, it's worth trying kosher out. Maybe try it on for a week and see how it feels.
- Your best bet is hanging out with a friend or Jewish teacher who keeps kosher, and have some fun cooking parties.
- There's a bit of a learning curve, and if you didn't grow up with it, you're going to want more than a YouTube video.
- This is part of the Judaism 101 series. Click here to see the next video on shabbat, and here if you want to donate and support
- the creation of more videos like this one. Be'te-avon!
- (That means "bon appetit" in Hebrew, and bon appetit means "let's enjoy eating" in French, but that's besides the point).
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