[561] in Vegetarian_Support_Group
using kosher symbols to deduce vegetarian-ness
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Mike Jacknis)
Mon May 15 19:39:09 1995
To: vsg@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 19:36:10 EDT
From: Mike Jacknis <mjacknis@MIT.EDU>
Kosher laws do not forbid meat but they do place restrictions on it.
Meat and milk cannot be mixed so a dairy kosher product has no meat in
it. Kosher symbols include a K and a U in a circle among others.
However, there are more complications if you are concerned about trace
ingredients, because the rules are subtle.
I sent the following letter and received the following response to/from
my friend in trying to determine some more details on this.
mike
My question:
Subject: kosher jello
Reply-To: mjacknis@MIT.EDU
if jello has a k on it, (i am assuming that means k-pareve because it
does not say k-meat) then does this mean the gelatine is not
animal-derived? What about if it is an O-U or O-U-pareve?
analogous question for the rennet in kosher cheese? is it not
animal-derived if it has a k-dairy? an o-u dairy?
(these questions were brought about from discussions among vegetarians
who want to know how to interpret the vegetarian implications of
kosher symbols)
thanks,
mike
Response:
------- Forwarded Message
To: mjacknis@MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: kosher jello
Date: Sun, 14 May 1995 20:39:02 EDT
concerning jello my impression is that a k does not imply that there is
not gelatin in it though an o-u does.
though with kosher cheese i think that an o-u still might not
imply that there are no animal derivative ingredients.
the reson is that in certain types of cases the law is more strict
concerning the use of non-kosher ingredients than the mixture of meat and milk
(like if the kosher meat by product is a far enough away derivative it
could be ok) but in other types of cases it is just the opposite
(ie greater strictess concerning mixtures of milk and meat than non-kosher
ingredients) - so with cheese i wouldn't be sure that there aren't meat
byproducts, whereas with gelatin and the o-u i would (though there are
oppinions that even gelatin coming from something totally not kosher is
far enough away from the sourse that it is ok - that is why i wouldn't say
just a "k" would imply no gelatin while i'm almost posative that that is not
the oppinion of the o-u)
------- End of Forwarded Message
