On Kosher Food
Can you imagine a world without bacon? Without cheeseburgers? Without bacon cheeseburgers? Without shrimp-broccoli-walnut?? If you follow the rules of kashrut (a.k.a. if you keep kosher), chances are your world doesn't include the delights of pork, shellfish, or meat and cheese antipasti. I work in a hospital that is 100% kosher - from the food in the staff cafeterias to the meals for patients - and I have been fascinated by the intricate rules of Jewish dietary law. I obviously am not an expert, but I've made several interesting observations and discussed practices with my Orthodox Jewish colleagues. In the bible, there is are loads of passages prohibiting loads of different things. One of the main things we hear about is that you can't mix meat and dairy (specifically: you can't boil a kid [baby goat] in it's mother's milk...very interesting parable). That means no cheeseburgers or pepperoni pizzas or bacon-egg-and-cheese-bagels!...