Kosher question.

It’s not friday night :slight_smile:

I understand that on a slaughtered animal the Sciatic nerve, and close areas are not to be eaten. There is a commercial for Hebrew Nation Hot Dogs(mmm good dogs) that says they only use the front half of the Cow. Personally I love some of the south end of the cow but that’s not important.

Back in the pre industrial days, when excess food was rare for pretty much everybody, but did the traditional Jews do with the Sciatic area. Most every group was pretty thrifty when they slaughtered something, as waste was deadly. Did they sell it to Gentiles? Give it to dogs? Have surgical butchers who cut the bad areas exactly but, saved a large amount of meat? And how much is expressly bad, It’s not actually the whole back half ofthe cow is it? It seems impossible to believe that they would kill the cattle, then leave half to rot.

kosher - Everything2.com :

It is possible to remove the sciatic nerve and the forbidden fats from the back end of a cow. The process is called porging. It’s not often done when the option of selling those cuts to the non-kosher market is feasible.

Yes, what they said. It’s never just wasted. It’s either sold to the non-kosher market, or experts remove the specific nerves and fats, whichever is more profitable/convenient.

Today in the US it is usually/always sold to the non-kosher market, but in Israel they often/usually remove the problematic stuff.