Not really, unless you want to discuss your allergy. I certainly understand your concern about eating out. Unfortunately I know that restaurants can fail to understand or follow allergy concerns, and are very unlikely to inform you if they haven’t. OTOH restaurants also get many complaints about people having allergic reactions and illnesses as a result of the food they’ve eaten, so I understand their side too.
You don’t actually know there isn’t also an allergy. It’s possible that halal will exclude some food the child has a medical sensitivity to.
Anyway, having thought more about it, in this specific situation, and assuming the child is elementary school (not yet a teen.)
I would call the parents and tell them that i didn’t learn that their child kept halal until after i fed him supper, because he told my son who failed to tell me. And I’d say that Johnny and Jimmy are friends, and i hope that Johnny can come over to supper again, but i don’t know the rules for halal, so I’d like to know what i need to do to make proper food for him in the future.
This:
- Puts the “blame” on my kid, not theirs.
- Allows them to ask what i fed their kid if they want to, without shoving it in their face.
- Makes it clear that i DO care about their dietary restrictions, and will follow them in the future
- warns them that their kid may not understand how to reliably convey to his hosts what his restrictions are.
I’m very careful about people’s dietary restrictions, so i WILL get it right next time. I’ve never accidentally fed anyone something they told me they don’t eat
Halal is more than just “don’t eat pork”. There is a lot of other requirements. If someone says “I’m halal”, the best they can expect is that the other person understands what that means at a very high level. It’s unreasonable to expect a non-halal person to understand halal to the nth degree, such as which foods are halal and which are not, which ways foods need to be prepared, if contaminated utensils and cookware can be used, etc. So in that respect, the halal person can’t get too upset if the meal isn’t fully halal. They are only doing the minimum effort to ensure it’s halal by saying “I’m halal”. If they really care about the meal being strictly halal, they should inquire as to how well the cook understands halal and should ask about all the ingredients and how they are being prepared. The sames goes for all religious and personal food preferences. If someone really cares, they need to make the effort to ensure they are eating according to their beliefs and restrictions. If they leave it up to others to comply, then it’s almost guaranteed that they won’t strictly adhere to their dietary restrictions.
Yes, it’s nice that more restaurants know what a food allergy means and recognize the epinephrine pack I carry on my hip. But I remember that was not the case even fifteen, twenty years ago when I was just a kid and often had to speak to the actual chef or line cook and sometimes read labels in the back rooms of kitchens. Even now I still ask if bread is baked in-house, if there are nuts in the pesto or mole or other specific thing, about cross-contamination if there is anything on the menu with nuts, &etc.
If you’re kosher or halal and the only steps you take (as an adult or older kid) are saying to the host or waitstaff, “I’m kosher/halal”, unless in an ethnic enclave, that’s evidence that you aren’t taking the restriction seriously and I’m not going to say anything. For a younger kid though, I wouldn’t make that assumption.
~Max
But in this case, the halal person is a little kid, and doesn’t understand that.
However, the kid has parents. It’s up to the parents to ensure the kid’s food is up to their standards for halal. If they are very strict, then they should probably call the host themselves to find out how well the host will comply. But if instead they tell their kid to convey it, then it’s up to the parents to ensure the kid accurately conveys the level of compliance. In the situation in the OP, it doesn’t sound like the parents are very strict since kids generally aren’t very good about that kind of stuff. If the parents level of strictness to halal is “We hope our kid tells the host”, then that doesn’t seem like they are following halal very strictly because kids generally aren’t very good about that kind of stuff and will likely forget to say anything.
Yeah. I’d still call the parents and ask, though.
I think you are assuming more similarities between kosher and halal than actually exist. While it is true that halal is more than “don’t eat pork,” the method of slaughter is the main concern beyond that. Unlike someone who is strictly kosher, a person keeping halal doesn’t have to worry about mixing meat and dairy, or whether a utensil used to prepare a pork-free dish was previously used on pork - as long as the knife was washed so no pork particles remain, it’s fine.
Confusion only seeps in around “gotcha” foods like marshmallows, which most people are surprised to learn are not halal unless you buy special ones that are.
Anyway, my point is that it is pretty easy for non-halal people to feed their halal friends in a compliant manner, since any vegetarian meal is acceptable.
ETA: I’m happy to be educated if my characterizations are incorrect. I lived in majority Muslim countries for nearly 24 years, so my “how to feed Muslims” education is purely OJT. I’m by no means a religious expert.
Truth be told, a lot of kosher Jews will also eat vegetarian. As with all things Jewish, there are many interpretations and many opinions, and there are certainly kosher Jews who keep separate dishes for meat and dairy. I have a friend who has a third set of dishes for pareve. But the talmud actually says that you can clean glass dishes, and the ceramic dishes at the time were porous, and probably couldn’t really be cleaned, and many modern Jews believe that modern dishes can be cleaned. Not all! But it’s fairly common for Jews to keep kosher by standards closer to what you describe, except that they don’t mix milk with meat. And of course the fasts are different.
I feed people who keep kosher by those standards somewhat often.
As usual I think puzzlegal has give us an excellent analysis of the ethics.
From a Jewish POV (I don’t specifically know of any Jews who would disagree, but I take it on faith that they exist!):
It doesn’t really matter if you tell us or not, because all we would do is say some prayers for atonement, and we’re already supposed to pray daily for atonement for any sins we might have accidentally committed, so we’re covered either way.
The only way it would be relevant is if the information might help us avoid similar errors in the future. In that case, you should tell us, and we are obligated to react in a way that minimizes embarrassment to our host.