What Does “Kosher” Mean?
In this lesson: You’ll learn what kosher means and how to make a shopping decision for a kosher meal.
You’re in the grocery aisle
It’s Friday afternoon. The chicken soup is on the stove, a friend is bringing dessert, and you’re in the grocery store buying crackers. One box says Plant-Based in big letters. Another has a kosher symbol from an agency you recognize, with a small letter beside it.
What makes food kosher?
Kosher food is food that Jewish dietary law permits. Whether a food is kosher can depend on what it contains, how it was prepared, and the equipment used to make it. When you plan a meal, there’s one more question: what can you serve it with? For example, kosher dairy crackers and kosher chicken soup can each be kosher on their own, while the dairy crackers are unsuitable for that chicken dinner.Source: www.chabad.org
Kosher means fit or permitted under Jewish law. In food, kashrut is the name for the Jewish dietary laws that govern what may be eaten, how food is prepared, and which foods may be eaten together.Source: www.chabad.org
Let’s stay with the chicken soup for a minute. Imagine someone hands you a bowl and says, “It’s just chicken, carrots, and water.” That tells you the basic recipe. You still have questions. Where did the chicken come from? Was anything else added? What pot was used? What else are you serving at the meal?
A useful way to start is to follow the food from ingredients to preparation to serving.
| Ask yourself | What it means in the kitchen |
|---|---|
| What went into it? | The chicken needs to come from a reliable kosher source. If you add packaged stock or a seasoning blend, check those products too. |
| How was it made? | The preparation and equipment matter. At home, you need to know which pot you’re using. At a commercial bakery, you may need certification to verify what happened on the production line. |
| What am I serving it with? | Chicken soup is part of a meat meal. When you add bread, crackers, or dessert, their meat, dairy, or pareve status helps you decide whether they fit. |
You’ll use the same three questions when you shop, cook, travel, or eat at someone else’s home. What changes is where you get the answer. At home you can look at the pot yourself. With a packaged product, you may turn to the certifier. At an event, you may need to ask who is supervising the food.Source: www.chabad.org
Meat, dairy, and pareve at the same table
Picture your dinner before anyone sits down. There’s chicken soup, a loaf of bread, a dish of butter, and sliced apples.
Chicken soup is meat. Butter is dairy. A plain apple is pareve, meaning it has neither meat nor dairy status. Bread is the item you still need to check. Its status depends on the product and how it was made.Source: www.chabad.org
Here’s how that changes what you do. You take the butter off the table. If the bread is reliably certified pareve and is suitable for the meal, you can serve it with the soup. You can also serve the apples for dessert. If someone brings a pie made with butter, you’ve got a dairy dessert and a meat dinner. You can thank them, save the pie for another occasion, and serve the apples tonight.
That’s one of the first practical skills in keeping kosher. Look at each food, then look at the meal as a whole. Both the chicken and the butter can have reliable kosher certification. The combination is what makes the butter unsuitable for this dinner.Source: www.chabad.org
Learn more in The Three Food Categories
What is a hechsher?
A hechsher is a kosher certification. On packaged food, you’ll often see it as a symbol identifying the certifying agency or rabbinic authority. The mark tells you who stands behind the certification. An accompanying designation can tell you how the agency classifies that product. Agencies use their own conventions, so check the issuer’s guide if a mark or letter is unfamiliar.Source: www.chabad.org
Now go back to the cracker box. You’re trying to answer two different questions:
- Can I rely on the certification for this product?
- Does this particular product fit the meal I’m planning?
Knowing the agency helps with the first question. Checking the exact variety and its designation helps with the second. If your friend swaps the original crackers for cheese-flavored ones, you have a new product to check, even if the box looks almost identical.
Does plant-based mean kosher?
You found a clue about the kind of product you’re holding. The claim still leaves questions about its kosher status and how it was made.
Turn the package around
Tap each part of this fictional cracker box to see what it tells you.
Sunny Field Original Crackers (fictional)
Text version of this activity
- “Plant-Based” on the front: This tells you how the brand describes the product. You still need to establish its kosher status.
- Ingredient list: You can spot listed ingredients here. You usually can’t see everything the certifier checks, such as how the ingredients were sourced or how the line is used.
- Mock kosher symbol: You found the certification mark. Your next step is to identify the issuer and determine whether you rely on it.
- Designation next to the mark: In this exercise, the certifier’s guide identifies these crackers as pareve. That makes this verified product a fit for the chicken dinner.
Try it without looking back
Your friend brings a reliably certified dairy dip and reliably certified pareve crackers to the chicken dinner. What can you put out with the soup?
Explore related lessons
- Reading a Kosher Certification Symbol(coming soon)
You’ve found the mark and want to interpret it.
- The Three Food Categories(coming soon)
Understand meat, dairy, and pareve in more detail.
- Preparing for Shabbat(coming soon)
The Friday night dinner leads naturally to the broader Shabbat experience.