Kosher Foods

Kosher foods are easy enough to find these days, thanks to specialty stores boasting full displays and product labels beaming with the word. But its meaning is slightly more complex. Whether you’re looking to go year-round kosher, celebrate for Passover or other major observances, or you’ve just always wondered what exactly kosher food entails, read on for a primer.

• The meat, milk and eggs of certain animals are permitted, while others are forbidden. Among typical fare, cows, sheep, goats and deer are kosher; pigs, rabbits, squirrels and horses are not. Most domestic fowl are kosher, including chicken, ducks, geese and turkey. And fish with fins and scales are allowed—so, you can eat salmon, tuna, flounder and carp, but not shellfish, catfish, swordfish, lobster or crab. Further laws govern how the animal should be killed and which of its parts can be eaten.
• Meat and milk are never combined, and often eaten with separate utensils.
• Just as the presence of trace chemicals can strip foods of organic certification, so can non-kosher substances render a food not kosher. So all processed foods and eating establishments that make the claim require certification by a reputable rabbi or kosher certification agency.
• Fruits, vegetables and grains are generally kosher, but they must be insect-free. Wine and grape juice must be certified.

A strict adherence to rules does not mean limited options: the kosher foods market is booming (enough to warrant an annual Kosherfest trade show in Secaucus, N.J.), and many producers pride themselves on quality ingredients that are also certified kosher. In fact, many of 2010’s NASFT sofi™ Silver Finalists were kosher foods. From Beth-El fruit preserves and La Panzanella Rosemary Mini Croccantini to Soy Vey Veri Veri Teriyaki sauce and Food Should Taste Good’s Multigrain chips, foodspring.com has its finger on the pulse of this specialty market.

Source: Chabad.org