Kosher foods are divided into three categories: meat, dairy and pareve. A detailed description of which foods are considered meat, dairy, and pareve is presented in the following chapters with practical guidelines for cooking and serving foods within each category according to Kashrut specifications.
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Meat and dairy foods may not be cooked together or eaten together. One may
not even derive benefit from a combination of meat and dairy foods; for example,
selling such a combined product or feeding it to a pet. |
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The laws of Kashrut require that we wait a period of time between eating meat and eating dairy. The Shulchan Aruch, the Code of Jewish Law, actually records two traditions, one of waiting for one hour (which the Dutch still adhere to) and one for six hours. The prevailing Anglo-Jewish custom is to wait for three hours. In the case of eating meat after milk, the same interval applies only after eating hard cheese. When eating meat after other dairy foods, it is not necessary to wait but one should clean out the mouth by rinsing or taking a drink and eating something pareve.
Foods that are neither meat nor dairy are called pareve. This means that they contain no meat or dairy derivatives, and have not been cooked or mixed with any meat or dairy foods. Eggs, fish, fruit, vegetables, grains, and juices in their natural, unprocessed state are common pareve foods. Other pareve foods include pasta, soft drinks, coffee and tea, and many types of candy and snacks. Products that have been processed in any way should be bought only if they bear reliable Kashrut certification. Although pareve foods present fewer Kashrut complexities than either meat or dairy foods, certain points must be kept in mind: Pareve foods may lose their pareve status if processed on dairy equipment or when additives are used.
Pareve food can generally be served with either meat or dairy meals. Some kitchens have serving and mixing bowls, pots, and knives used exclusively for pareve food. These are always washed separately from meat and dairy dishes. One should also have separate dish sponges, dish towels, and draining boards. If a pareve food, however, is cooked or mixed together with any meat or dairy products it becomes respectively either meat or dairy and all laws pertaining to meat and dairy apply, including the required waiting times.
When a pareve food has been cooked in a meat pot, one should serve that food only on meat dishes. Similarly, pareve food cooked in a dairy pot should be served only on dairy dishes. However, a waiting time before eating foods of the opposite time is not required. If a pareve food was cooked in a clean meaty pot and it is required to serve it during a dairy meal, or vice versa, one should consult an Orthodox Rabbi.
Sharp and spicy foods such as onions, garlic, lemons, and pickles which are cut with a meaty knife are considered as a meaty and may not be used with dairy foods, and vice versa.
Utensils used for cooking, eating or direct storage of food which are made of metal or glass should be dipped into a Mikvah(ritual bath) before use. This is nothing to do with the act of "koshering" non-kosher vessels but it is required even for new kitchen utensils. Utensils made of plastic do not require immersion. China should be immersed but without a Beracha.
The same fridge or freezer can be used for both meat and milk. However care should be taken to ensure that the foods themselves should not come into contact with one another . It is useful to mark food put in the freezer to avoid mistakes when it is defrosted.
The vast majority of detergents are non-problematic. All the main brands (e.g Fairy Liquid) are approved Kosher and pareve.
An egg containing a blood spot may not be eaten. When breaking eggs before cooking it is customary to examine each egg separately on its own in a glass. However, one is allowed to boil eggs and eat them without checking for blood spots.
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Since it is not possible to distinguish Kosher milk (i.e. milk from a Kosher animal) from non Kosher milk, Rabbinical law requires that milk be supervised from the point of milking until it is bottled in order to guarantee that it comes from a Kosher animal. In countries where the source of the milk offered for sale is guaranteed by civil law(such as the UK), some authorities rule that all milk is guaranteed as Kosher and need not be supervised. Supervised "Kosher" milk (Chalav Yisrael) is widely available now a days in the major centres of Jewish life. |
Any pure butter is Kosher; "blended" butter may mean a blend of butter with non Kosher margarine and it is therefore non-Kosher.
CHEESEAll cheese must be Rabbinically certified. This is because the curdling agent, the rennet, is often derived from an animal source- usually a calf's stomach. The Rabbis in the Talmud ruled that all cheese must come from a supervised source, even where the rennet was made from herbs. So vegetarian cheeses cannot be used, unless they have a Rabbinic seal. |
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They are in general Kosher; some may however contain gelatin, or unspecified emulsifiers or stabilisers, which render them non Kosher. Fromage Frais is not Kosher without Kosher supervision.
Bread usually contains fat, which may be of animal (or unknown) origin. There is also the possibility of an emulsion or glaze being applied to the crust, or of non Kosher fat being used to grease the baking tins; such fat need not appear on the list of ingredients. Further, the bread may be baked on the same trays or in the same ovens as non Kosher bread or cakes; this too would render it non Kosher.
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Even when the ingredients and equipment are known to be kosher the Rabbis discouraged the consumption of bread not manufactured by Jews (Pas Akum), though in a place where Jewish-manufactured bread is not available, or is of inferior quality, commercially produced non-Jewish bread can be used. In practice, no generally available non supervised bread is known to be Kosher. |
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Wine and grape juice must come only from rabbinically approved sources- but not for the same reason as cheese. The Sages put a ban on non-Jewish wine primarily as a safe guard against intermarriage, believing that by drinking out one might end up dating out. Hence products like brandy and wine vinegar must also carry a Rabbinic seal. As is happens, non Kosher ingredients occur in the manufacture of non-Jewish wines, such as bull's blood for colouring or more commonly, isinglass, a "fining" agent, which comes from a sturgeon - another reason for avoiding them. |
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They contain fats and emulsifiers which may be of animal origin; even the manufacturers of "vegetarian" margarine cannot always guarantee that the source of their emulsifier is vegetable. Only margarine under rabbinical supervision can be used.
In the 20th Century, Kashrut has had to contend with a whole new challenge, processed foods. Thanks to the efforts of kosher food technologists, thousand of products on the shelves have been cleared for use by Jewish consumers.
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Increasingly, more products carry a Kosher label- like the, Kosher London Beth Din logo introduced a few years ago. Each ingredient and food additive of a Kosher certified product has to be individually checked to ensure it does not derive from a non-Kosher source. Many seemingly innocent products, such as yoghurt, may contain gelatin, spices may contain stearic acid salts, and even breakfast cereal may contain glycerine of animal origin. |
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Even where the ingredients are fine, the product may still be non-kosher because of other unlisted processing aids used in it's manufacture such as release agents used to grease the production lines. Thousands of others listed in the Really Jewish Food Guide have beed approved after rigorous inspection of the ingredients and the manufacturing procedures used.
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