Israel’s Other White Meat

For any kosher law abiding Jew, visiting Israel is an opportunity to eat some of the things that are normally prohibited from eating back at home. What are those things? McDonalds, Burger King, KFC, Subway…you know, all those wonderful looking restaurants you pass by every day jealous that you cannot partake in their food’s consumption.

Okay, maybe I’m going a little extreme. For one, the smell of those restaurants grosses me out enough that even if I wasn’t kosher, I wouldn’t eat there. But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t chow down on a Big Mac the next time I’m in Jerusalem. It’s all part of the experience.

While not all food in Israel is kosher, it is actually, for the most part, illegal to sell pork products there. However, the BBC has a really great feature today about Kibbutz Lahav, where, because they raise pigs primarily for animal research, they have an exemption to slaughter and eat pig products.

The whole read is very cool but I think my favorite part is this line:

But over the years, the Kibbutz’s identity has changed. Pork is on the dining room menu less – just Fridays and holidays – these days, as more traditional and religious Jews have moved in.

You know, we wouldn’t want to eat pork on a Wednesday. That is just wrong. But Shabbat? Why wouldn’t we?