Some of the fats of domesticated cattle are called chailev and are forbidden. Not being a butcher (and not having ever seen them since they are not sold at meat stores that I frequent) I really couldn’t tell you which fats are cheilev and which ones aren’t
It is an added expense. But there are a fair number of kosher resturaunts that have been around for quite a while, so it is possible for a kosher resturaunt to survive in an area with a large enough Orthodox Jewish population. As for how much it costs, I really don’t know. You’d want to speak to someone who owns/runs such an establishment.
Is he allowed to? Yes. But in practice he probably wouldn’t. People would no doubt wonder if they saw a bunch of pigs go into a Jewish slaughterhouse and a bunch of hams come out.
Thanks for all the answers, Zev. If you are at a company picnic or some kind of holiday gathering, how do you do the food thing? Have you ever told an employer that you are kosher? I worked for a hard-core catholic family once. They ordered a ham for the holiday party. They refused to provide a kosher alternative for the Jewish employees.
This is generally true. I was actually thinking of a case where the shochet was given the pigs to slaughter on behalf of someone else (i.e. he was not the owner of the pigs in question). It didn’t even occur to me that he might own the pigs.
Just to put it in perspective, while it is quite important to Orthodox Jews to keep kosher, it isn’t to Conservative or Reform Jews. I’ve actually only met a handful Conservative of Reform Jews who has ever seriously kept kosher, and these would be rabbis and others deeply tied to the Jewish community (And I know many, many, many, many Jews). Many Conservs/Reforms don’t eat leavened foods during Passover and the like, but as far as not eating pork or milk with meat or shellfish it just isn’t happening.
Well, the official line on Conservatism is that kashrus still applies and it’s observance is mandatory. How many “Conservative” Jews actually hold to the position is another question.
I would think that slaughtering a pigs in a jewish slaughterhouse woud render the whole place unclean even if they were taking no profit from it. That’s just my WAG based on the posts you’ve made about a proper kosher kitchen.
For example, if you took your cold piece of pork and put it on my plate, it would not render my plate non-kosher. All I would need to do is to wash off the plate very well to make sure that no pork remains, and I could use the plate. The same would apply to the raw pork in the slaughterhouse.
(Note: The above does not apply to hot foods. If you put a hot piece of pork on the plate, the plate would become non-kosher and have to be kashered before it could be used again.)
