You know, I've taken a lot of crap from the Kosher police in my lifetime: marshmallows, select Dunkin' Donuts locations, fancy cheese, and while I was growing up, Oreos! All verboten by the munchy-hatin' rabbis that make the Kosher rules. But now they are going after my beloved lox, and I am putting my foot down.

Gothamist reports that though the OU denies it, ultra-Orthodox group Chevra Mehadrin is revoking the hechsher (stamp of approval) of all lox, due to a parasite that sometimes infests wild salmon. Personally, I'm willing to risk a few worms here and there if it means chowing down on that perfect bagel on a Sunday morning!

Sure, I might be falling prey to the sensationalist nature of internet news, but I can't help starting a call to arms when a Jewish delicacy is threatened: save the lox!

No word yet on popular dishes like narwhal casserole, moose milk ice cream, or boar sausage, but it seems like things are going to get a little tough for Israeli residents with a taste for the "exotic": 

"Knesset members are intensifying their objection to the proposed ordinance presented to the Knesset on Monday, which sets customs rates, exemptions and merchandise tax. As reported on Thursday, the ordinance includes unique items, and especially non kosher ones.

Among the items listed in the ordinance are pig meat, meat from horses, donkeys, rabbits, hares, whales, dolphins, seals, walruses, reptiles, crabs, oysters, octopuses, and even snails. Authorization of the tax rates for the list items is none other than Knesset Finance Committee Chairman Moshe Gafni (United Torah Judaism), a detail that has raised quite a stir within the legislature."

(Via)

Eli Valley has never been one to back down from a controversial viewpoint. In his new comic for Jewcy (complete with beautiful coloring/shading by our very own Craig Leinoff), Valley borrows from that other great Jewish artist, Chagall, to give you a unique perspective on the hubbub surrounding the AgriProcessors kosher abbatoir in Postville, Iowa.

This article first appeared on December 5, 2008 and has been republished as part of the series JEWCYEST WEEK EVER.

JDub's Director of Events, Adam Teeter and his fiancee Naomi are planning their wedding - and their new life together. Naomi was raised in a kosher home, and so Adam has decided to learn to make some great kosher recipes. He's starting off with a very Thanksgiving-appropriate recipe: parve mashed potatoes. It's perfect to serve with turkey, and delicious to boot:

At a glance, there really aren't that many "movements" in Judaism. Orthodox, reform, reconstructionist and conservative. That's pretty much it. Sure, there are some variations on this, but compared to the Christian world, Jews like to keep it simple.

Or do we?

I decided to jump into the proverbial rabbit-hole of Jewish Denominationalism and discovered that there are more ways of being Jewish than there ever have been before.

Secular-As-Balls:

You still don't understand WHY Jews believe in G-d. Frankly, you think the whole "G-d Thing" is irrelevant. There's nothing about being Jewish that requires religion, customs, beliefs, worship, a love for Israel or the Jewish People. But if anyone DARES to slam the Jewish People or pretend that the Holocaust didn't happen, you'll be the first to kick their ass. It's like being an older brother: you can torture your siblings all you want to. But the minute some other kid tries to pick on your kid brother/sister, you're going to pound them into the ground. You express your faith (or lack thereof) by reading Heeb Magazine and going to the opening of the new Jewish Museum in your neighborhood. Just try to avoid the rabbi at all costs!

See: anyone on the Tattoo Jew Facebook Group

Hippiedox:

The product of Orthodox or immigrant parents, you voted for Obama because he's cool like the new iPhone. Your tone of voice moves between stoner and yiddishkeit, and your love for Matisyahu at times rivals the Lubavitcher Rebbe. You're more comfortable at Whole Foods than you are around your conservative in-laws, but you still feel a sense of sadness when a non-kosher restaurant opens near your shul. Kabbalah is your favorite pastime, because it's like being on a permanent acid trip.

See: Shemspeed, FrumSatire and "that guy" on the Birthright Israel trip.

Chabad-Could-It-Be: Thanks to Chabad's supply chain of eager rabbis, your small town of approximately ten Jews just got an Orthodox shul. Too bad for you that you have a shaved head, love bacon and still don't know what a mezzuzah is. But because you feel a cultural connection to Judaism, you decide to start attending services. You really hate the religio-political attitude of Chabadniks, but because this movement offers you the "real" Judaism that you cannot muster for yourself, you keep going back as an atonement for all the Friday nights you spent playing X-Box instead of reading the Good Book.

See: any Jew living west of the Mississippi river and east of Phoenix, Arizona.

Trans(gender) Denominational: You're an activist within Judaism. You want to reform (no pun intended) every corner of the Jewish World. Your obsession with Tikkun Olam really has nothing to do repairing the world as a whole, but instead concentrating on key issues within Judaism. Such examples include gay/lesbian rights, trans-inclusion, gender feminism, environmentalism and animal rights. You can't settle on one shul because they just don't address your "issues". Like a serial monogamist, you fall in love with one synagogue/rabbi and work the hell out of it until there is nothing left, then move onto another hot affair.

See: Union For Progressive Judaism, Barney Frank, and Kosherveg.com.

PolitiKosher: You love Israel. In fact, you're IN LOVE with Israel. There's something about the desert, the ruins, the graffiti and the bombs that just gives you this tingling feeling in your stomach. You think the Palestinians are secretly plotting your death and that if Netanyahu could just get his act together, the Messiah will surely come. Hopefully that person is you. Just in case, you've got your passport and a duffle bag filled with tallit ready to go.

See: Friends of the IDF, the Libi Fund and anyone wearing an "I Love The IDF" T-shirt.

Deconstructionist Judaism: Innovation is the tradition of the Jewish faith, and you are its greatest champion. You believe that G-d has a great sense of humor and personally marvels at your creative thinking skills. You pioneered such moments in Judaism as the chocolate seder, dog and cat bar mitzvahs, and menorahs hacked together from leftover Ikea stuff. You express your Judaism by taking Jewish ideas and making them better.

See: Moderntribe.com, Rabbi Laura Baum, Mel Brooks.

Many religions approach their movements like a ladder: the higher up you climb, the more "authentic" your faith. And generally speaking, the more conservative practice is usually what you're striving for. Judaism has a motto of horizontally-intergrated faith. A belief that Judaism is not a climb to the top, but rather a continuum that you place yourself on. More liberal? Slide to the left! More Orthodox, then move to the right.

Judaism, for me, is more like a spider web. A spider web starts by having a few pillars to hold it together. From these platforms, the spider is able to weave its web to the center. The purpose: to catch what the spider needs in order to survive. If one of the pillars that the web is connected to simply cannot hold the web, then the creative little spider finds a new anchor. If someone breaks the web from the inside, then the spider repairs it, differently than it was originally created. Still, the web stays intact. And every spider web is different, just like everyone's Judaism.

Some names are tough to grow up with. When yours is a little hard to pronounce and--oh yeah--universally associated with the dry, cracker-like stuff made by the company your great-grandfather founded, "it can be a real problem," says Laura Manischewitz Alpern. "Nine people out of ten can't help but make some kind of matzah joke, and as a kid, you just want to be like everyone else. It took quite a long time to get used to that and to start feeling proud about the name."

Alpern, who now lives with her family in Geneva, is in New York the week before Passover to talk about her book, Manischewitz: The Matzo Family - The Making of an American Jewish Icon (KTAV Publishers, 2008). It is a novelized account of her great-grandfather's voyage to America, the origins of his company, and the unfolding narrative of the generations that followed. And if there is a central message, it might be this: Manischewitzes are people, too.

At the Museum of Jewish Heritage in lower Manhattan, several dozen people have gathered to hear Alpern chat onstage with cookbook author and all-around Jewish American culinary authority Joan Nathan, despite an April downpour. (Or perhaps they have come for the promised free box of Manischewitz's best--"though that may not have mattered," one of the organizers tells me. "Nobody likes soggy matzah.")

Most of the discussion will center on the pioneering and somewhat domineering figure of the company's founder. Dov Behr Manischewitz was a man who, quite literally, made a name for himself. In her book, Alpern recreates the moment when her great-grandfather, born Abramson in Lithuania, presented the U.S. immigration papers to his startled wife: "Look, Nesha, this is our name in America. May God grant us prosperity with it!"

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So I'm a new Jew. I was raised Roman Catholic by an Italian mother from North Jersey - I was fed pasta in lieu of formula. When it comes to the six main food groups, the three most important are pasta, bread, and macaroni & cheese.

In my journey to become better versed in Jewish practice, I've tried to reconcile a lot of ideas in my head. I was never raised particularly religious, so dropping the act of going through the motions in the Catholic Church was never a big deal to me. Getting into the habit of Friday night worship competing with plans made by those who pray on Sunday mornings has become manageable as well. I've learned lingo and proper behavior, I've learned a little Hebrew, and I've learned the best way to prove my dedication to Jewish culture. But some things have been harder than others.

Keeping kosher isn't something I feel I'm capable of adhering to just yet. I see it more as a twelve-step process. I grew up on Genoa salami sandwiches and live for summers at the shore where I can get a fabulous chicken cheese steak. I can't just give it all up cold turkey - all food puns aside. And so I've resigned myself to dealing with the idea of kosher in the future; I have other ideals to work on in the meantime.

Something I'm okay to start out with, however, is keeping kosher for Passover. It's only eight days - totally manageable, right? Except when you realize the only foods you eat are either chametz or kitniyot.

I breathe in bread. By virtue of growing up a picky eater, I was raised on a diet solely consisting of pasta, pizza, and macaroni & cheese. And by virtue of being a busy college student in a tiny dormitory kitchen, my default meals are as follows: pasta, rice, macaroni & cheese, rice & beans, gnocchi, breaded chicken, and the occasional black bean burrito. Seriously. I snack on crackers, pretzels, cookies, and goldfish. Nothing that I eat on a regular basis immediately strikes me as kosher for Passover, with the possible exception of chocolate pudding. Surely it can't be this hard for "normal" Jews.

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Please, oh please, let this be true.

The Daily Mirror, a popular British tabloid, is reporting that supermodel Kate Moss is preparing to release her very own kosher cookbook. Moss apparently has prepared some kosher meals for her boyfriend, Jamie Hince, lead singer of band The Kills, and finds it so fun that she wants to make money off of it. Kate's recipes are apparently inspired by ones she learned from her friend, British socialite Stasha Palos, who has her own cookbook coming out this year. Kate has apparently learned to make latkes, chicken soup, and honey cake.

First of all, is Jamie Hince Jewish? I had no idea. Maybe he just happens to like Jewish food.

And secondly, Kate Moss publishing a cookbook? How could that not be the most hilarious thing ever? You know Gwyneth Paltrow is going to be so pissed that Kate is stealing her idea. Maybe Kate will do a sanctimonious email newsletter full of lifestyle "tips" next. I would seriously sign up for that. 

Not too long ago, I was in New Orleans on a three-day work conference.  Having never been to the Crescent City before, I decided to seek out many of the city’s culinary delights.  But after I had tucked into a bucket of boiled shellfish, enjoyed a platter of jambalaya,  étouffée,  and maque choux, at Mother’s Restaurant (World’s Best Baked Ham), slurped down a fried oyster po’boy and munched on a muffuletta – I was acutely aware that the only kosher thing I had enjoyed during my brief stay was a bucket-sized plastic cup of beer.

So, what could be kosher in New Orleans a city famed for its Creole cooking – a cuisine dependent on many non-kosher foods?  According to one kosher-keeping Tulane alumni, and a couple of rabbinical students, it is tough to keep kosher outside of one’s home in NOLA.  Before Hurricane Katrina ravaged the city there had been several vegetarian restaurants and the Creole Kosher Kitchen in the French Quarter – although to date none have reopened.  Possibly the only kosher restaurant left in town is Casablanca and the Kosher Cajun Deli located in the suburb of Metarie.  Café du Monde, the French market cafe famed for its beignets (fired dough doused in powdered sugar) and chicory coffee received its kashrut certification in time for Chanukah this past year.  But are there any traditional New Orleans dishes that are kosher?

One traditional dish NOLA revelers are treated to during the Mardi Gras season (Fat Tuesday can fall on any Tuesday between February 3 and March 9) is the King Cake.  Twelfth Night Cake also known as King Cake is a braided yeast cake smothered in brightly colored royal gaze and sprinkles. A bean, coin or even a glass figurine is baked into the cake (this token represents Baby Jesus) and whoever finds the token in their slice of cake is crowned the “King” and is obligated to make the cake next year.

Mardi Gras is the celebration whereas Christians clean their kitchens of things that would be forbidden during the following 40 days of Lent – like a more debacherous Biur Chametz.  This celebration manifests in various ways around the world – from the classy masked balls in Venice to the near-naked debauchery in Rio – New Orleans’s traditional Creole-influenced Mardi Gras celebrations involve weeks of parades kicked off with the Krewe du Jieux and the Krewe de Mishigas.

So, looking at recipes of King Cake, it sounds a lot like challah (except obviously for the Baby Jesus part) as challot are sometimes covered in sprinkles or baked with chocolate chips.  I’m told there is a similar practice (at least in part) once a year when some Jews place or imprint their house key into the Schlissel challah.

But what else do people enjoy in the Big Easy?  Anyone else know any other good kosher Creole dishes?

Cross-posted from the Jew and the Carrot 

How did Dominique Courbe, a non-Jewish, second-generation butcher from Normandy end up behind the counter at the only kosher French brasserie and butcher shop in Manhattan, Le Marais?  And how did his boss, Jose Meirelles, a former banker from Portugal, end up owning said restaurant?

Ironically, these two men are changing the landscape of kosher meat in New York City, offering high-quality, aged meats and a diverse selection that is virtually impossible to find in other kosher establishments.  I spoke with Courbe and Meirelles about their decidedly unorthodox career paths, the inspiration behind what they do, and the "meat alchemy" that goes into making a kosher filet mignon.  Read on.

Dominique next to a mountain of homemade jerkyJose, what was your inspiration to create an upscale kosher brasserie like Le Marais?

Jose: I used to own a similar restaurant - that was not kosher - called Les Halles, and some of our clients began pushing us to open up a kosher version.  [Here, in New York] there were lots of situations where, at business meetings or family gatherings, someone in the group keeps kosher, or someone has started to take keeping kosher more seriously than before - and they had no place to go.  There weren't really any good restaurant options - maybe a few delis, but nowhere they were proud to take their family or business associates.  So they said to us, "Why don't you guys take this restaurant which is wonderful and do it kosher?" 

At first we hesitated because, how can you make a cassoulet without pigs' feet?  And of course you can't do pork belly or oysters or any of these things.  A brasserie without oysters, you know, scandal!

So why did you decide to move forward? 
Jose: We consulted with a rabbi to guide us through the rules of what it takes to open a kosher restaurant.  At the time, the kosher meat available was very tough and not good quality.  But we realized the reason that kosher beef was tough was because no one was aging the meat.  Once we found out that there was nothing in kosher law that prevented someone from aging beef, we went to a couple of butcher shops, bought some prime ribs and aged it ourselves in our own refrigerator at Les Halles.  At the end of four weeks of aging, the meat was as good as non-kosher.

Why don't kosher distributors age their meat?
Jose: On the non-kosher market, every single seller has an aging room and they sell their meat aged.  On the kosher market, it is not there.  I guess it might be for economic reasons - it takes [a significant investment of] money.  Still today, any kosher restaurant that wants to have aged beef, needs to do it themselves. That requires refrigerator space, and especially in New York City, that is difficult.

Jose and Dominique with well-aged beefTell me a little bit about your backgrounds - long before you ever even considered working in the kosher world.

Dominique:  My father was a butcher, so I learned with him.  I started when I was [almost] 12.  It was summertime and my father went like this [makes a beckoning gesture with his hand] and said, "I need you."  I remember my dad used to kill [the animals] himself.  Myself, I've only ever killed rabbits.  [As kids] we used to watch the killing - you know, bloody stuff.  It is kind of gross, but as a kid [it is fascinating].

I trained in Normandy then went to Paris for a couple of years.  Then I went to Djibouti and Switzerland where I worked in the meat department of a supermarket, and then I came here.  I worked at a meat purveyor in DC before I came to New York in 1992.  I started working over at Les Halles, the non-kosher restaurant.  Then when Jose opened Le Marais, I came here.

Along the way, did you ever think about another line of work?

Dominique: At first I was studying to be a banker, but it didn't work!

Jose: That makes two of us!  I grew up in Portugal and went to business school and worked in a bank.  Then I decided to come in the United States and spend a sabbatical year to travel.  I wanted to buy a car, do Route 66, the whole thing.  In the meantime, I started to get odd jobs cooking because I needed to make money to go from city A to city B.  I realized that my function in life, my calling, was cooking - even though I never cooked in Portugal and had never dreamed of being a chef. 

After I went to the French Culinary Institute, I started working in different restaurants in New York.  At one point, I was working at a very popular restaurant that wanted to offer something that, in France and Portugal is very popular - the steak frite.  Just a simple steak with fries, nothing else.  After work, [my coworkers and I] wanted to go to a place like this, and there wasn't one.  There were plenty of great steakhouses, but it was not the kind of meat you wanted to eat at one in the morning.  So that's why I came up with the idea of opening Les Halles with a butcher shop in front - like a bistro or brasserie menu, which in Paris focuses on shellfish and oysters, but with meat.

How does the relationship between your butcher shop and your restaurant work? 

Jose: We have the best of both worlds.  We can have a beautiful display of meats in the butcher shop and also sell it in the restaurant through specials.  I also learn a lot with Dominique because he knows his meats.  My point of view is as a cook, but sometimes we get questions or requests from customers that, if I did not have a butcher like Dominique around, I could not do it - or at least not as well.

What percentage of revenue comes from the butcher shop versus the restaurant?

Dominique: 1 percent to 99 percent.

Jose: No! [laughs] It is about 15 percent from the butcher shop.  It is fairly good revenue - the butcher shop works very well. 

Dominique: The popular cuts here are the rib eye and the butcher's cut is also very popular.  And we offer Wagyu beef - it goes for about $90/pound for the rib eye, which is a good deal.  The Wagyu hamburger meat at the butcher shop is about $8/pound.

Downstairs at Le Marais, where the meat lives.Are there other butchers that work here with you?

Dominique: I have two guys downstairs.

Jose: But Dominique is the master butcher!  As a French butcher, he has a different training then an American butcher.  French training is really much more meticulous about the cut - they have the ability to go muscle by muscle to deconstruct a very large piece of meat.  Each one has different textures and flavors.  The American butchers tend to use much simpler cuts. 

At Les Halles, which also used to have a butcher shop, the business was always very little.  People never realized that the meat case or the butcher was there.  They never said, "Let me go to Les Halles to buy meat."  Here it is different because it is kosher.  There are not all that many options for good quality kosher meat, so people come here to order.

Le Marais is known for offering several types of meat that are hard to find kosher.  Besides well-aged meat, what do you offer and where do you get it?

Dominique: Our 5-6 different purveyors are all in NYC.  The meat mostly comes from the Middle West.  They are all exclusively kosher purveyors. [editor's note: Le Marais rarely sourced meat from Agriprocessors, so the raid last spring and eventual closing of the plant did not significantly impact their work.]

Jose: [Pointing to a large piece of meat] This is the mother cut - the rib eye.  Most of the cuts we offer come from that. Dominique is able to take away the fat and creates this [points to another piece of very lean looking, rare red meat]. There is no real filet mignon in the kosher world because kosher butchers can only use meat from the rib to the neck [of the animal].  So we needed to create a cut that resembled the filet.

Working fast behind the butcher counter.One of the things that is very well known, that everyone raves about, is the beef jerky.  Do you make that here?  How?

Dominique: We use a type of meat like brisket.  We smoke the meat here - we have a smoker upstairs [at the restaurant].  Then we freeze and slice it and marinate it in spices.  Then we dry it and air-dry it.  It is about a three-day process. 

Do you miss anything from your days working in the non-kosher world?

Dominique:  I miss eating pork, but I do not like to work with it - the texture of the meat is not great.  I prefer beef or lamb.  [In terms of technique], we work in the French way, so the technique for cutting the meat is pretty much the same.  If you cut a rib eye here or in France, it is the same.

Jose: For someone who is not Jewish, [working here] is great because there is incredible time off.  I have most of the weekend off - that is unheard of!  Even though I did not work seven days a week at Les Halles - you have days off - the restaurant would still be open, so my mind was always there.  So now, for me, in the spring and summer time, we are only open on Sunday. There is a different piece of mind. 

Is there a growing sense of interest in good quality kosher meat?

Jose: Absolutely.  I see the suppliers are getting better and better - they are stepping up to the plate more than they used to.  In the beginning it was a disaster.  We used to send back half of the order sometimes because they would send you terrible things. There was no quality control.  Now, it is rarer and rarer for us to send something back.  They are sending much better quality meats - bigger animals, better marbleized animals.  Some suppliers now try to sell only specialized and good quality meat.
I think there was once a mentality from the suppliers that thought, "Well the kosher market is going to eat kosher no matter what - they don't eat anything else, so why bother?  They don't have a choice."  That has changed. 

Meat that looks you right in the rib eyeAre people willing to pay for better quality meat?

Jose:  I don't know much about the market from before when I started this business about 14 years ago.  But back then, people were paying more money for kosher meat without the quality.  So now, they are paying more or less what the non-kosher market pays, but getting better quality. 

A lot of people now who keep kosher did not grow up keeping kosher.  So they know what good meat should taste like.  That segment of the market is pushing for a much higher quality of meat, and also everything else.   If you know what a good steak tastes like, then you know what to expect.

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Le Marais
150 W. 46th Street
New York, NY       

We've all made those jokes, spinning out the thread of ever-increasing absurdity, layering hypothetical violation on top of hypothetical violation, all to determine: What is the least kosher meal you could possibly eat?

Are we talkin' shrimp wrapped in prosciutto and dipped in butter sauce? (I'm sure Paula Deen is, if no one else. Scratch that, Paula will just take the butter sauce).  Perhaps a pork-and-cheese sandwich with chopped lobster on top.  Maybe just eat a whole freakin' pig with some creme fraiche. At a certain level, it's hard to refine the criteria.

Until now.

Ladies and gentlemen, the universe has spoken, through two guys named Jason Day and Aaron Chronister, professional barbecue experts from Roeland Park, KS. They have created (drumroll please): The Bacon Explosion.

This contraption involves stuffing meat into meat, basically the treyfiest turducken you can imagine. Lattice-work bacon, layered (lard-erd?) with sausage, topped with already-cooked bacon, rolled and then smoked for about one hour per inch of thickness (that's what s/he said.)

Followed by porkgasmic gorging, presumably followed by arterial failure of some kind.

The New York Times piece on these guys and their creation even quotes a Jewish guy ('cause hey, it wouldn't be a Times story if they didn't. Gotta make it relevant to their readership) saying "It wasn’t planned as a send-off for me to Israel, but with all of the pork involved it sure seemed like it."

There, there, Jew. Surely the Holy Land will be rewarding in ways more fulfilling than anti-heckshered gluttony. Or, um, not. Good luck with that. In the meantime, I have to go throw out all my fake bacon and contemplate what the hell is wrong with me that I won't eat this beautiful manifestation of God's creation, both of pigs and human ingeniousness.

Like many of you, I thought this was a joke, unfortunately it is not. It seems that there is a whole economy based on the ridiculous modern day stringencies posed by Rabbinical authorities who in my view should be more worried about mikvah molestation scandals then whether or not someone wipes their ass with toilet paper or tissues on shabbat.

The website hawking this product is a piece of work, it is reminiscent of latenight infomercials that try and convince you why you should purchase the Time Life best of hair metal 60 CD set.

Marketing ploys like claiming how ass wiping never felt so kosher and product testers claims of how people will break shabbos if not for such a product, are abundant on the website selling shabbos bathroom tissue.

“I like putting items in our home that remind us that we are Jewish and that it is Shabbos”
-survey respondent

Don't know about you, but I don't really feel a Jewish connection to toilet paper?

My absolute favorite line on the entire website is the following:

“As an engineer involved in wastewater processing, I approve of something that'll have more people in the frum community using toilet tissue instead of facial tissue in their toilets on Shabbos.”
-survey respondent

"Wastewater engineer" Give me a fucking break!!!

On a side note I posted this on my blog and it sparked an interesting discussion 64 comments in length.

Since I last posted on Agriprocessors, shortly after the company was hit with more than 9,000 counts of child labor violations, the company's "former" CEO (and still current VP) Rabbi Sholom M. Rubashkin was arrested on felony immigration and identity fraud charges. That was followed two weeks later by his second arrest on felony bank fraud charges. Rubashkin faces more than 50 years in federal prison, along with more time in state lockup.

Agriprocessors itself was indicted shortly after Rubashkin's second arrest, and the company faces millions of dollars in fines.

Early in November, Agriprocessors declared bankruptcy.  Then, on November 14, the day of Rubashkin's first federal arrest, Agriprocessors missed its payroll, leaving workers – many of them already poor – without money and, in many cases, food. Production ceased shortly after.

Now Agriprocessors' court-appointed trustee, Joseph Sarachek of New York, is trying to restart production and pay workers – at least those workers who play ball with the company.

In effect, Sarachek is running a plantation with slavery replaced by indentured servitude. If workers come back to work, they will be given back wages owed to them in dribs and drabs. If they do not come back to work, they will need to wait for the final bankruptcy settlement  – which means they likely will never see any money. Secured creditors like banks get paid first, and Agriprocessors has more debt now, including potential fines, than industry experts I've spoken with believe it has equity.

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Sandy on her getaway vegetable bike

Watching Chef Sandy Stollar cook is kind of like having front row seats at the Daytona 500. Born in Queens to a Colombian-Argentinean Jewish family, Stollar embodies all the fast-paced energy of a native New Yorker, and all the credentials to make it in the big city.

Unlike most (ahem, all?) kosher chefs, Stollar trained at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) and shined her knives at some of the best non-kosher restaurants in New York City (the Russian Tea Room, Osteria del Circo, etc.) More recently, she started her own private chef business called The Kosher Tomato, which caters to Jewish individuals and families across New York and New Jersey. She also teaches cooking classes at the Center for Kosher Culinary Arts in Brooklyn – a school which houses the first accredited kosher culinary training program in America.

Stollar, who was recently featured in the “Heeb 100,” is undoubtedly one to watch in the coming years. Below, she shares which foods she misses most from her pre-kashrut days, her thoughts on why kosher cuisine has such a sketchy reputation, and her favorite ways to make a nice piece of chicken.

You've said that you're so passionate about food that you even get excited about tomatoes. Where does that passion come from for you?

That is really a hard question, believe it or not. I don't want to say it's because I am good at it, because in the beginning I probably wasn't. But as far back as I can remember, I always had an unquenchable thirst for anything food-related. I believe it has to do with the fact that cooking is an art that uses all of our senses. It's like the old adage "the way to a man's heart is through his stomach"- I think this applies to anyone.

You got your culinary training at the CIA-essentially the butter and bacon capital of the world. When/why did you decide to go kosher?

CIA is known as the Harvard of culinary schools. At the time, I was not strictly kosher, and I knew I would get the best education there. About 2 years after graduating, I met someone (now an ex-boyfriend) who influenced my thinking about keeping kosher and Judaism. He basically said, “If you're not even home on Shabbat [to celebrate], how will you continue your traditions and teach them to your children? That was enough to make me want to start changing [and become more observant]. I was really into him and in a way, I suppose, I wanted to do it for him.

I made the transition [into the kosher world] by working at Levana, a kosher restaurant on the Upper West Side of New York, and knew that this is what I needed to continue doing. A couple years down the line, I started The Kosher Tomato, Inc.

What do you miss most from your pre-kosher days?

I miss working with all those great chefs and having the opportunity to learn from them. Not to say that there aren't any great kosher chefs, but I think that notion is relatively new, now that Jews are becoming more interested gourmet food.I also miss using exotic ingredients from around the world – like Thai fish sauce, sirloin steak, curry pastes without certification, gelatin, etc. – things that we cannot use because of kosher restrictions.

Are there any ingredients that you consistently have a hard time finding with a hekhsher?

I have not found mascarpone cheese yet. Other than that, I do pretty well.

Kosher cuisine has gained a reputation as being sub-par to other cuisines. Why do you think that is? Do you think there is any truth in that critique?

Honestly, somewhat! I believe that as a culture, we have had too much happen in our history to focus on food! Also, as other cultures did, we used ingredients that were abundant where we lived, but we are also limited by that, as well as by our dietary laws. In other words – if you have a lot of potatoes growing nearby, your cuisine will revolve around potatoes. You can only be so creative!

However, I definitely think this is changing with great kosher restaurants opening – places like Prime Grill, Solo, Le Marais, Park East, and Abigael’s in Manhattan – and a growing interest in good, kosher cuisine.

What is your opinion on using standard (but often unhealthy) kosher "substitutes" like margarine and non-dairy whip?

I think there are good reasons why [in the kashrut system] we are meant not to eat certain ingredients, and also certain ingredients together. I think we should keep it that way! Healthy and natural.

Most of my clients do not have a problem with this – in general, they don't want to mess around with fresh, simple cuisine. In fact, I have a weekly client that I wanted to use soymilk for once for a cream soup (which I don't personally think is as bad), but she was not into that idea at all.

What is your personal mission/vision as a chef?

I think that it's pretty simple - I want to offer affordable and practical chef services of all kinds to the Jewish community.

I focus on the Jewish community because I am part of that community - I know the culture and have found my niche. There aren't many personal chefs focusing only on kosher food preparation, so I think I have an advantage there. Ultimately, I want to [positively] influence the way the Jewish community eats. I'm not sure how that will happen yet – all I know is that I would like to make a difference.

What foods do you personally cook/eat most often? What do you eat most when you're on the run?

I love chicken, so I eat that a lot - chicken glazed with pomegranate is excellent and coconut lemongrass chicken with citrus dressing and chicken with mango salsa are some of my favorites. When I am on the run, I usually grab either a sandwich, yogurt, a snack bar or fruit.

How is the current economy affecting your business? Are you finding people more reluctant to hire a personal chef? Or are people looking for more opportunities to eat at home?

Ironically, our current economic situation is not impacting me as much as I thought. Maybe it's like you suggested - people are looking for more opportunities to eat at home. Plus, people always want to eat healthier than they do, and my services help them. Overall, I think people hire me for the practicality.

If you could cook for anyone in the world (past or present) - who would it be and why?

If I could cook for anyone, I think it would be Chef Gray Kunz. He is an amazing chef, mentor, and person in general who I worked with for a short while at Spice Market.

Honey, Darling?: agave, honey.The various ethical, environmental, and cultural issues surrounding honey have been considered and discussed on Hazon's blog The Jew and the Carrot, both in posts and comments.  Leah has explored whether honey is “kosher” for vegans, and wondered if there’s “any ethics-based diet that *doesn’t* have a little bit of hypocrisy clouding up its ideals.”  Michael Croland from HeebnVegan explained that the issue does little to promote veganism, and pointed us in the direction of this Satya Mag article on the subject.  Meanwhile, Rabbi Shmuel has suggested that we should critically re-examine the Rosh HaShanah custom of dipping apples in honey, and explore alternatives such as maple syrup, while Rabbi Debbie Prinz joined the conversation with a lip smacking guest post on how we can integrate chocolate into our Rosh HaShanah celebrations.

Rather than continue the debate on whether honey is vegan, eco-kashrut, or even just kosher (Leah notes that she has always “puzzled over how eating a food created by a decidedly non-kosher creature could be considered okay for the Tribe”), I’m offering a number of delicious, vegan, kosher, and organic ideas and recipes for a sweet new year.

Agave Nectar: Derived from the succulent plant of the same name, agave is like honey’s sophisticated big sister. Satisfyingly sweet and sticky, it makes for a perfect apple dip, plus it has a low glycemic index, a long shelf-life, and it won’t crystallize.  Madhava Agave Nectar is available in different grades, is certified organic, and is kosher.  It’s available online and at many markets across the US.

Maple Syrup: As Rabbi Shmuel noted, maple syrup is an ideal choice for Rosh HaShanah thanks to its rich symbolism and earthy sweetness.  “Maples,” he explains, “represent the ultimate in chesed (lovingkindness) giving freely of not only their wood and shelter but their sap - their very essence.” Shady Maple Farm offers certified organic, kosher, pure maple syrup, as do Coombs Family Farms, Highland Sugarworks, and a host of others.

Brown Rice Syrup: Rich in rice protein concentrates, brown rice syrup has been said to have a healthy effect on cholesterol levels, and may help to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. Because it’s produced from a whole food source and is composed of simple sugars, brown rice syrup is considered to be one of the healthiest sweeteners in the natural food industry.  With a light, sweet flavor and the consistency of honey, this is another great option to experiment with on Rosh HaShanah.  Lundberg Family Farms offers brown rice syrup that’s organic, eco-farmed, vegan, kosher, and gluten free!

Date Honey: It’s interesting to note that references to honey in the Torah are said to have referred to honey made from dates. This is quite possibly the ultimate symbolic Rosh HaShanah food, and also the hardest to find.  Our own Leah offered a recipe on the Lilith blog last year, but you may still have time to track some down at a local Middle Eastern market, or order it online in time for the holiday.  Try here and here.

Chocolate: It’s incredibly easy to find vegan chocolate these days, and what’s more, you can often find vegan chocolate that’s also organic and fair-trade.  Simply melt some semisweet, vegan chocolate chips with a drop of soy milk or oil in a saucepan over medium heat.  Allow it to cool a bit before dipping your apples, bread, and fingers!

Vegan Caramel Sauce: Little goes better with apples than sweet, sticky, mouth watering caramel.  Unfortunately for vegans, caramel often contains milk and butter.  Not to worry, though!  Try one of these recipes for vegan caramel sauce, which create a thick, sweet, pourable alternative.

[Cross-posted from the Jew and the Carrot]

Did you know that the little kosher symbol on your food may have a geopolitical, rather than strictly religious, purpose – especially if you live in Israel? Some Orthodox rabbis in the Holy Land use that symbol to reduce the number of Palestinians working in Israel. Here’s how it works:

Jewish law requires that many foods be cooked by Jews. This means that even if the ingredients are fully kosher and the food was prepared in a kosher kitchen under the watchful eye of an Orthodox Jew, if a non-Jew did the cooking, Jews are not supposed to eat that food.

Of course, if you’ve eaten a kosher restaurant lately, you probably noticed non-Jews working there. You may also have noticed that many of those non-Jewish workers seem to be directly involved in food preparation. That’s because Jewish law has provisions in place to circumvent the ban. And herein lies the story.

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Rubashkins: not winning any prizes anytime soonSince the raid on the Agriprocessors plant on May 12th, bashing the kosher meat giant has become something of a sport. Everyone from the New York Times to failed messiah to yours truly has taken a few shots (some cheap, some well-deserved) at the Rubashkin family and the business they run out of Postville, Iowa.

I’ve never been a big fan of the Rubashkin family. In fact, I called for a boycott of their meat in January, months before Uri L’Tzedek was on the case. But I’m getting a little frustrated with the way the scandal is being dealt with by liberal-minded people like me.

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Be Kind to Your Hoof-footed Friends: for a cow could be somebody's mother We Jews just love to beat ourselves up. We can't even get depressed without feeling guilty about it. This weekend is Tisha b'Av, the one time of year when Jews get to have a good old-fashioned bitching session. We weep and wail and curse at the miserable treatment of Jewish people throughout history: the destruction of both Temples, the expulsion from Spain, the Nazis.

Historians--at least, those historians who sport peyes and streimels and use the Chumash as a source text--say that all of these Jewish catastrophes happened on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av. That's today, for those keeping track. The rub, though, is that Judaism is pretty clear on why these things happened: because Jews screwed up.

The first temple was destroyed because Jews worshipped idols, slept around, and killed people. The second temple was destroyed because Jews were feeling too much hate toward their neighbors. The Holocaust happened because...well, whatever we did wrong there, it must have been pretty bad. I guess it takes a Chief Rabbi of Israel to explain such a thing.

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On May 12, 2008, 900 federal and state law enforcement personnel raided Agriprocessors, the country’s largest kosher slaughterhouse. They arrested almost 400 illegal alien workers and had outstanding warrants for hundreds more. On the day of the raid, more than two thirds of Agriprocessors’ workforce was illegal.

Reports of horrific worker abuse by Agriprocessors quickly surfaced, and a federal official present during the raid called conditions at Agriprocessors “medieval.”

It was the largest single-site immigration raid in US history, but the raid was not the first time Agriprocessors or its owners, the Rubashkin family of Chabad hasidim, have been in trouble with the law.

These are your kosher butchers:

Name: Abraham Aaron Rubashkin Age: Early 80s Last Seen: Denying guilt

Aaron Rubashkin, a Russian-born Brooklyn butcher and Chabad-Lubavitch hasid with widespread business interests, founded Agriprocessors in 1987 after buying an abandoned slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa. In order to keep the plant open while paying what many regard as the industry’s lowest wages, Aaron Rubashkin turned to illegal, undocumented workers, first relying on Eastern Europeans funneled to Postville from Rubashkin’s Brooklyn butcher shop, as Stephen G. Bloom documented in his 2000 book Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America. When securing enough Eastern European illegal workers became difficult, Rubashkin turned to illegal workers from Mexico and Central America, reportedly paying them below the minimum wage and forcing them to work 14 to 17-hour shifts with unpaid overtime. Agriprocessors allegedly supplied illegals with forged identity papers and other documents. Over the years, Rubashkin bought up much of Postville’s available real estate, renting homes and apartments to illegals at what many consider to be inflated rates. Among the charges hurled at Rubashkin after the ICE raid was his alleged tying of property rental to employment, with illegals told that they should rent from Rubashkin in order to secure a job at Agriprocessors. Those workers then were trapped in an allegedly exploitative rental agreement that saw their rents raised monthly. Renting elsewhere meant loss of employment, transfer to an undesirable job within the plant or to an undesirable shift. Rubashkin was cited by the National Labor Relations Board for collecting union dues from workers at another business he owned, Cherry Hill Textiles (this with son Moshe – see below) but keeping the collected dues for his family. The National Labor Relations Board found the Rubashkins had a “proclivity” for violating the National Labor Relations Act and mandated repayment of all money collected, with interest. He was also implicated in the Allou Healthcare bankruptcy scandal. Although not charged, Rubashkin was found to have accepted $3.2 million dollars in payments from Allou, for which the government could find nothing Allou received in return. Speaking for Agriprocessors, Rubashkin’s son Sholom M. Rubashkin (see below) at first claimed nothing was given to Allou. Later, he amended his statement to claim Allou – in the healthcare equipment and pharmaceutical business – purchased $3.2 million dollars worth of kosher meat. No trace of that meat has ever been found and Rubashkin claimed the Agriprocessors executive responsible for the Allou transactions died at his desk in 2004, taking all details of the “sale” to his grave. Rubashkin was forced to pay $1.4 million dollars to help replay Allou’s creditors. Allou’s owners, Satmar hasidim, are now serving jail terms for fraud.

Name: Rabbi Sholom M. Rubashkin, Agriprocessors VP and CEO Age: Late 40s Last Seen: Dodging Immigration Agents

Ordained by Chabad, Sholom M. Rubashkin pursued a career as a Chabad House rabbi. In 1987, he was compelled by his father to leave the rabbinate and take over the on-site operations of Agriprocessors in Postville. Agriprocessors’ battles with the town of Postville, the EPA, the USDA, PETA, and the United Food and Commercial Workers Union have all been led by Sholom M. Rubashkin. Under his watch, slaughterers used meat hooks to rip out the throats of still conscious animals and kicked blood in the eyes of dying animals. Agriprocessors so polluted the environment that the the company was sued by the EPA. The Rubashkins eventually settled with the EPA, paying a $600,000 fine. Additionally, turkeys produced by Agriprocessors were found to have sodium levels far in excess of stated amounts. Along with his sister’s husband, Rabbi Milton Yehoshua Balkany (see below) Sholom M. Rubashkin is a frequent and generous donor to Republican political campaigns, giving tens of thousands of dollars to favored candidates including Catherine Harris, Iowa Senator Charles Grassley, Iowa Congressman Tom Lathum, and Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter. The family’s contributions to Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Patty Judge’s campaign for governor at a time she was responsible for regulating Agriprocessors also raised ethical issues. The family’s bundled contributions given to Grassley, Specter, and Harris – $20,000 each – along with lesser contributions to Lathum drew PETA’s ire in 2005, when PETA Vice President Bruce Friedrich noted: “A federal legislator should not be taking money from a company that is being sued by one federal agency [the EPA – Rubashkin settled] and that is under investigation by another [the USDA – Rubashkin was found to have violated Humane Slaughter Law but the Bush Department of Justice declined to prosecute]—that just screams conflict of interest.”

Name: Rabbi Milton Yehoshua Balkany Age: 62 Last Seen: Playing Tony Soprano

The husband of Abraham Aaron Rubashkin’s daughter Sarah, Balkany is notorious for his practice of bundling campaign contributions to skirt federal campaign finance law, handing envelopes full of checks from various Balkany-Rubashkin family members to politicians. Balkany’s largess largely benefits Republican candidates, and his bundled contributions give him – and his father-in-law – aggregated influence. In 2003, Balkany was detained on charges he misused $700,000 in HUD grant money intended for handicapped toddlers. Most of the money had been transferred by Balkany into bank accounts controlled by his children, including at least one in Israel. Balkany also used this grant money to pay his personal credit card bills and to pad his personal bank accounts. In a deal with the US Attorney’s office, Balkany – who claimed his actions were sloppy accounting practices, not theft – agreed to make restitution and to refrain from seeking any more federal grants. He was never prosecuted. Balkany has been implicated in other scandals involving government funds and is now barred from lobbying Bureau of Prisons officials after allegations of bribe-taking surfaced. Balkany also tried to have a Jewish aide to then-US Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan excommunicated after the aide wrote memos detailing Balkany’s strong-arm attempts to force the Israeli government to use US aid money for Balkany’s pet projects in Israel. In an attempt to end Orthodox justice group Uri L’Tzedek’s boycott of Agriprocessors, while officially representing Agriprocessors and his father-in-law at a meeting in mid-June, Balkany reportedly threatened the Orthodox justice group’s leadership in a manner eerily reminiscent of Tony Soprano.

Name: Moshe Rubashkin Age: 50 Last Seen: Pleading guilty

The elder son of Abraham Aaron Rubashkin has a criminal record stretching back twenty-five years. He was arrested in 1983 for felony assault and rioting (he later pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges). As noted above, in 1995 he and his father were caught collecting union dues from their Cherry Hill Textiles employees but keeping the money for themselves. The National Labor relations Board forced the Rubashkins to repay the money taken with interest, and banned their attorney from practicing before the NLRB for six months. In 2002, Moshe Rubashkin was arrested for bank fraud. He pleaded guilty and served almost two years in Fort Dix Federal Prison. Just months after his release, Moshe Rubashkin was elected president of the Chabad-Lubavitch-controlled Crown Heights Jewish Community Council, which annually receives and administers millions of dollars in government funds. Late last year, Moshe and his son Sholom (the nephew of Agriprocessors’ CEO/VP Sholom M. Rubashkin) were indicted on federal charges related to the family’s abandoned textile mill in Allentown, Pennsylvania, which burned in a series of suspicious fires. Although the family engaged in a convoluted cover up meant to hide ownership of the property and defraud the EPA and the city of Allentown, Moshe Rubashkin was only charged with illegal storage of hazardous waste. His son was charged with knowingly making a false statement to federal authorities. Both charges are felonies. Originally due to be sentenced on July 16, the government agreed to postpone sentencing until November 3 to allow Moshe Rubashkin and his son more time to repay the $450,000 they owe the EPA. The rub? The money for this repayment appears to be coming from other Rubashkin family members who themselves draw their income from Agriprocessors and related companies, not from Moshe Rubashkin himself. When pressed, an official close to the case could not explain the need to allow Moshe Rubashkin and son to remain free to facilitate this repayment.

Name: Nathan Lewin Age: About 70 Last Seen: Defending Agriprocessors

The noted constitutional attorney has long served as legal counsel for Agriprocessors, and Lewin is also closely connected to Agudath Israel of America, the ultra-Orthodox advocacy organization. As I first reported in late 2004, on October 23, 2003, Agudath Israel officials, and, I’m told, Lewin, along with rabbis from various kosher supervisions, met with senior USDA staff in Washington. My sources tell me that Lewin did not disclose his connection to Agriprocessors. The subject of that meeting was a USDA directive that outlawed “sawing” during religious slaughter. Agudath Israel claimed the directive’s current language could easily be misinterpreted by USDA inspectors and would, they feared, be used incorrectly to stop kosher slaughter. The USDA agreed to change the language and relied heavily on Agudath Israel – and, it seems, Nathan Lewin – to write a new directive. What made its way into that new directive? Approval of a second cut to “facilitate bleeding” – the basis for Agriprocessors’ meat hook throat-ripping exposed by PETA. During the furor surrounding exposure of that throat-ripping, Lewin played the Holocaust card, comparing PETA to Nazis and alleging PETA’s true aim was to end shechita. In the days immediately preceding the release of PETA’s undercover video, Lewin told a sympathetic reporter for the New York Sun that he, as Agriprocessors counsel, had offered to discuss with PETA and, if necessary, resolve any problems at Agriprocessors. PETA, Lewin claimed, never responded to him. The actual letter Lewin sent to PETA – now posted on PETA’s website – shows that Lewin misrepresented the tone of his letter and that Lewin and Agriprocessors did not offer to meet PETA. At the close of Agudath Israel’s national convention in November 2004, on the eve of the release of PETA’s exposé, Agudath Israel leader Rabbi Chaim David Zwiebel asked the convention for a unanimous vote condemning PETA and supporting Agriprocessors. He got that vote – even though no one voting except for Lewin had seen PETA’s evidence. The USDA, in response to PETA’s video and other documentation, conducted its own investigation and found that Agriprocessors violated the Humane Slaughter Act. It also found its inspectors took illegal gifts from Agriprocessors and often slept or played computer games on the job. The USDA kept that decision secret for almost one year, while the US Attorney for Northern Iowa declined to prosecute. PETA forced release of the damning USDA findings by filing and actively pursuing Freedom of Information Act requests against the agency.

Name: Menachem Lubinsky Age: Unknown Last Seen: Spinning

Head of Lubicom, a kosher industry marketing and PR firm, Lubinsky is a former Agudath Israel of America VP and a current member of its board of trustees, as well as a longtime paid consultant and flack for Agriprocessors. Yet, in his role as editor of the industry trade journal Kosher Today, and as a sought after expert for media reports on kosher food, Lubinsky commented on various Agriprocessors scandals without identifying himself as a paid consultant of Agriprocessors. Like Lewin, Lubinsky played the Holocaust card, comparing PETA to Nazis and alleging PETA’s true aim was to end shechita.

Name: 5W Public Relations Age: 5 Last Seen: Impersonating Competent PR professionals

America’s “fastest growing” PR firm counts Agriprocessors, Paris Hilton, "Girls Gone Wild" producer Joe Francis, a handful of Israeli politicians, Pastor John Hagee, and various hip hop artists among its clients. Headed by CEO (and former Betar-USA head) Ronn Torossian and SVP Juda Engelmayer (owner of the Lower East Side icon Kossor’s Bialys), 5W was caught impersonating critics of Agriprocessors online. 5WPR at first denied the impersonations, and then blamed them on an unnamed “intern.” The problems for 5WPR multiplied when it became clear the “intern did it” excuse was not credible. In the wake of the massive immigration raid that crippled it, Agriprocessors promised to comply with the law and to begin a new era of ethical business. Despite those promises, Agriprocessors continues to retain 5WPR.

Since federal agents conducted an immigration raid on the Postville, IA, AgriProcessors meatpacking plant on May 12th, the Jewish community has been in a furor over everything from worker’s rights, to accusations of sexual harassment, to the possibility of a kosher meat shortage if AgriProcessors is forced to close.AgriProcessors: disconnected and unprofessional? In the last week there have been a fair number of developments:

• The Jew & The Carrot has an interview with Zalman Rothschild, a former mashkiach (kosher supervisor) at AgriProcessors. Rothschild says there was a nice rapport between the rabbis and the Mexicans who worked at the plant (except with the women, ahem) when he was there, but calls AgriProcessors “unprofessional” and “disconnected” from the day-to-day operations.

• Ben Harris at JTA went to Postville and spoke with Sholom Rubashkin, now former CEO of AgriProcessors. Though Rubashkin insisted he was “clean as a baby” and offered to give Harris a tour of the plant, the offer was eventually reneged, and Harris was referred to the company spokesperson, who refused to discuss the allegations the workers are making about hiring minors, forcing workers to take 14 and 15 hour shifts, and an environment of sexual harassment. Harris also went to Brooklyn to speak with Aaron Rubashkin, who started his business in 1953, the same year he emigrated from Russia. The elder Rubashkin was more forthcoming than his son, and flat out denies every allegation made. He comes across as scattered and affable, but uninformed. Included in the article is a lengthy audio clip of the interview.

• The Chicago Tribune reports that the State of Iowa is easing up on many of the fines that it initially imposed on AgriProcessors. After AgriProcessors “promised to improve safety for its workers” the fines were reduced from $182,000 to $42,750. Iowa Congressman Bruce Braley is concerned about the reduction in fines, and has spoken to the AP, explaining that he understands the reasoning behind the shrinking fines, and hopes AgriProcessors can live up to their promise to improve conditions for workers.

Aaron Rubashkin and his son Moshe: a tad evasive

• AgriProcessors frequently shipped meat to smaller communities, where other kosher meat and poultry options weren’t available. These communities are now feeling the pinch as AgriProcessors struggles to fill orders, and many are left without any kosher meat, reports the New York Jewish Week.

• The Forward reports that demand for AgriProcessors meat (which sells under the brand names Aaron’s Best, Rubashkin’s, Shor Habor, Iowa’s Best Beef and Supreme Kosher) has not slowed since the immigration raid on May 12th, and if anything they’re struggling to fill orders with the reduced output from Postville.

Giraffe: served with fingerling potatoes? Should you ever find yourself presented with the chance to eat giraffe, rest assured that it's not a violation of kashrut—just a violation of the unspoken rule that people really shouldn't eat potentially endangered species.

Heeb reports that the tall, spotted, long-tongued African ungulates have been declared kosher by Israeli Rabbi Shlomo Mahfoud. JTA affirms that since giraffes have cloven hooves and chew their cud, they are totally kosher.

JTA also explains that eating giraffe meat only went out of fashion because the task of making a biblically correct slice on those notoriously long necks gave kosher butchers some serious headaches. Their puzzlement did not, however, inhibit the consumption of giraffe milk (also kosher), which is incredibly refreshing on a hot Saharan day!

Karmically Safe: giraffe snax The resident wildlife experts here at Jewcy did a little digging and discovered that despite their dwindling numbers, giraffes are not currently shielded by an animal protection act. But because giraffe parts are sought after for "good-luck bracelets, fly whisks and thread for sewing or stringing beads" (their tails are considered to be especially precious), not to mention their meat and hide, the otherwise all but predator-less, nice-guy creatures often fall victim to human attack. Despite what the San Diego Zoo might say, it sounds like giraffes are in some serious trouble.

In short: We are not enthused that Rabbi Mahfoud just gave the world a thumbs up on giraffe cutlets. If you must, try the milk. But if you want to do something truly Jewish, find out how you can help save giraffes on the Wildlife Conservation Society website and sate yourself with animal crackers.

The British version of "The Apprentice," helmed by Sir Alan Sugar, a Jew, has an odd source of controversy this week: kosher vs. halal chicken. It also touches on the "who is a Jew" issue, and has us wondering why anyone would put "good Jewish boy" on their resume.
Michael Sophocles: a half-Jewish schmuck
In last week’s episode, two teams were tasked with haggling for various items in Marrakech, including  a kosher chicken.  One team succeeded, but the other ended up with a chicken that was halal. (At the market, they keep asking that the chicken be blessed by someone from the mosque and inexplicably making the sign of the cross. You can watch the video here).

Michael Sophocles was one of the two people sent to look for the kosher chicken, and when his team was called to the boardroom to discuss their loss with Sir Alan, he was called out for his lack of knowledge of kashrut, for not knowing what l’chaim means, and for putting "good Jewish boy" on his CV, which Sir Alan concluded was basically just a method of kissing up. His scintillating response: Well, he’s half-Jewish, and he does know what the word schmuck means.

Sophocles narrowly avoided being fired, but the whole spectacle is really amazing to watch. (You can see the boardroom interrogation here and here). In the boardroom Sophocles also refers to himself as a “nice Jewish boy” which seems in direct conflict with his claim that he “will manipulate others if necessary to get the prize.”

While it’s embarrassing that someone who claims to be a good/nice Jewish boy doesn’t know that there’s a difference between kosher and halal, it’s more depressing that knowing the word schmuck is Sophocles’ main claim to Judaism. And then there’s the issue of “half-Jewish.” Since his last name is Sophocles, it’s reasonable to assume it’s his mother who’s Jewish, and while Sophocles clearly can’t be expected to understand the nuances of Halacha, that would in fact make him 100% Jewish. Can someone really claim membership to Judaism with a line like "good Jewish boy," but simultaneously hide behind a disclaimer of half-Jewishness?

Sir Alan, at least, has a nice way of dealing with the situation. “I don’t give a shit,” he says. “Talk about chickens, I’ve got headless chickens right here.”

He May Look Delicious: but he ain't kosher

Ann VanderMeer, wife of bleeding-edge fantasy writer Jeff VanderMeer, says ET is treyf. When she's not busy working as the Fiction Editor of Weird Tales magazine, VanderMeer -- an observant Jew -- finds time to tutor Bar and Bat Mitzvah students. She recently fielded questions from Jeff's ravenous companion animal, Evil Monkey, regarding which imaginary animals are kosher. Ever wondered if would be halachically okay to eat a Cornish Owl Man? Find out on Jeff's blog.

Here's an appetizer, from the M's:

Man-Eating Tree - A: “Tree part yes, man-eating no, therefore treyf.”

Mermaid - A: “No, for the obvious reasons.” EM: “What if you marry one? Is that kosher? Will a rabbi marry you?” A: “Kosher is a term about eating, not about sex.” EM: “I’m not talking about sex–I’m talking about marriage!” A: “If the mermaid is Jewish, the rabbi will probably marry you. But only if you’re Jewish too. But you’ll definitely have to find the right rabbi…”

Mongolian Death Worm - A: “No, because you cannot eat anything that crawls on its belly.” EM: “Does that mean an injured kosher animal that is crawling along isn’t kosher any more?” A: “Yes, because you can’t eat an animal that’s been injured or is sick.” EM: “It’s a wonder you haven’t all starved to death.”

Just in time for Passover, lots of religious pet news! This week we learned that Pope Benedict XVI's loves cats -- he even has an authorized biography written by a furry friend named Chico who was his neighbor in Germany. The book is called “Joseph and Chico: The Life of Pope Benedict XVI as Told by a Cat" (as told to journalist Jeanne Perego).

As for Jewish furballs, a recent article at Petside.com suggests that Passover is the perfect time to have your pets keep kosher too. While the dogs at my seder (there were four!) seemed to enjoy a stray matzoh ball, the article doesn't offer much insight into KforP pet food. It does, however, provide some helpful hints for keeping Fido kosher the rest of the year:

The companies that now provide kosher kibble adhere to the strict separation of meat and dairy to qualify the food as kosher for animals. This does not make the pet food kosher for human consumption, and in a kosher household, the animal’s dish would have to be washed in a bathroom or laundry room sink, separate from the kosher supplies in the kitchen.

Of course, there are no Jewish laws stating that pets must keep kosher, but for pet owners, it can be a way to ensure that beloved dogs and cats are getting high quality food. In no time at all, they'll be ready for their Bark Mitzvahs.

Shrimp: Verdict is still out on shrimp flavored chips Stop! Put down that bag of frozen shrimp! Our sources inform us that it’s not kosher!

This week all members of the Orthodox Union’s e-mail list received an urgent “kashruth alert” regarding Full Circle Shrimp, a brand of frozen shrimp produced by Topco Associates LLC in Skokie, Illinois. According to the e-mail:

These products are bearing an unauthorized OU symbol and are being withdrawn from the marketplace. Consumers spotting these products are requested to contact the Orthodox Union at 212-613-8241 or via email at kashalerts@ou.org.

The OU must have decided to get involved before too many people got punked into eating treif. The moral of the story is, if you have to ask why the shrimp was kosher in the first place, chances are something fishy is going on. So put those toothpicks and that dipping sauce away. If you’re gonna eat shrimp, you’re going to have to take the tofu route.

Any Way You Lick It: Maple-Bacon LollipopThough it might sound like a sick joke, it's true: The folks at Lollyphile have created a Maple-Bacon lollipop for the pork lovers among us. Before you start gagging, you should know that these suckers are fully sustainable and organic, made with only the finest cured bacon and Vermont maple syrup. Based in San Francisco, Lollyphile strives to produce “the most interesting and unique lollipops in the world,” and laughingly provides the disclaimer “definitely not kosher” for their popular meat suckers, which have completely sold out. Also on the Lollyphile menu: Absinthe suckers.

But what about kosher Jews who want in on the fun? Why no chicken soup lolly with specks of matzo ball? Or how about Gefilte fish with horseradish? Applesauce with latke bits, anyone?

We are issuing a challenge, Jewcy readers: What Jewish-inspired flavors should Lollyphile try next? And would you eat them?

Related: Last year, the flavor experts at Jones Soda released an all-kosher holiday season soda series which, ironically, included a Christmas ham flavored beverage.

Top Chef Hung Huynh Says: meet me at 56th and madisonKosher-keeping New York fans of Top Chef's season three winner, Hung Huynh, are in for a tasty treat: The incredibly creative cook has officially begun a one-month stint as Executive Chef at Solo, a Midtown Manhattan Mediterranean-Asian fusion glatt kosher restaurant. Try saying that three times fast with your mouth full of pickled veal tongue. (Why is veal kosher, by the way, when it's so undeniably cruel?)

Huynh set up camp at Solo yesterday, and will remain in the kitchen there through early April. Though the restaurant has been inundated by a deluge of emails and phone calls, space is still available and reservations are welcome.

Related: Jamie Oliver Is Not In Training To Be A Shochet

Jon Stewart: doesn't trust the pigsForget whether or not Jon Stewart believes in God: To some, he actually is God, which makes it all the more interesting that he questions the well-known law of kashrut that prohibits Jews from eating pork. The "TV personality, comedian, political gadfly, insightful commentator and all-around raconteur" (as his humble parishioners describe him) seems to think the rule is hogwash. If the following quote is any indication, Jon Stewart will start keeping kosher when pigs fly.

"Thou shall not kill. Thou shall not commit adultery. Don't eat pork. I'm sorry, what was that last one? Don't eat pork? Is that the word of God, or is that pigs trying to outsmart everybody?"

Previous: Michael Showalter on God, spiritual salvation, and corduroy pants.