According to this source, shellfish isn’t allowed.
Another distinction is rabbits and camels. They’re allowed under halal but prohibited under kosher.
One other thing worth remembering is that one item of meat cannot be both halal and kosher by most standards. Halal meat must be slaughtered by a Muslim and kosher meat must be slaughtered by a Jew. Obviously no animal can be killed by both a Muslim and a Jew so the meat is always going to be off limits to somebody.
My Boss is a Chassidic, very Orthodox Jew. He was massively overweight, so bad he qualified for weight loss surgery and lost 150 pounds. So obviously earing kosher doesn’t necessarily equal thinness.
He now follows a mostly low-carb diet. No easy to do, avoiding meat and shellfish.
Why does he have to avoid meat?
We always envied my cousins who got to drink soda with all their meat meals while we drank milk. Of course that is far from healthy. Also I had the impression that kosher meats were not only saltier, but also fattier. That is obviously not a necessity, but that was my impression. Think corned beef.
I grew up on broiled chicken and veggies (outside of holidays my mom was a pretty mundane cook. Holidays on the other hand were great). Nothing about kosher food makes it fatty anymore than a typical diet does.
Crap! I meant avoid pork. Pigs aren’t kosher.
Actually, sorry I don’t have a cite at the moment, some Muslim authorities have ruled that kosher meat is halal. I’m sure somebody else will be along with a cite. If not, I shall have to do some searching.
Back To The OP
Not necessarily. I can keep kosher by eating nothing but beef fat and drinking nothing but Dr Brown’s cherry soda. Certainly Maimonides thought a kosher diet was healthier. But later scholars have pointed out that Maimonides was a doctor and prone to explaining things in medical terms.
What does "kosher’ mean for mass-produced foods like cheese, coca-cola, etc? Are these products any different from non-Kosher, or just certified to be so?