KASHRUT COULD BE CHEAPER IF PORGING RETURNS

Last week (Dec 27) there was an article in the JC on the cost of kosher meat.

One important point was not touched on.The London Board of Shechita ban the use of hind-quarter meat as there are not people trained to porge it. [Porging is the process of removing all blood vessels from the meat.]

This means that every animal shechted [slaughtered according to shechita] must have the hind part sold to a non-kosher butcher.

If an animal costs £2000 and you then pay £50 to a shochet to kill it, and £50 to a rabbi to check that it is kosher, your total cost is £2100.

If you sell the hind part to a nonkosher butcher, he will only pay you half the cost of the animal — £1000.

The kosher half of the animal has now cost you £1100.

This is one reason why kosher meat costs more than non-kosher meat.

If the rabbis allowed butchers to porge the hind part, then we could all have a whole kosher animal for £2100, not £2200. This would bring down the cost of kosher meat.

It is wicked that the cost of kosher meat is unnecessarily high, as it discourages Jews from buying kosher.

The London Board of Shechita banned porging over 70 years ago as a “temporary” measure while they trained men to porge properly. It is about time porging was again permitted.

Men are trained to porge in Israel, France and the United States. If a man can be trained to perform a brit mila on a tiny portion of flesh of an eightday-old baby boy, he certainly could be trained to porge.

Bring back porging and reduce the cost of kosher meat. Zvi Silver Broadfields Heights Edgware

While applauding the article on the cost of kosher meat, I would point out that it did not take account of the difficulties in the small provincial communities, many of which no longer have a butcher (or for that matter a baker), are reliant on travelling to the larger communities or having meat imported.

Is it not incumbent on the chief rabbi and the Beth Din to assist as much as possible the community in keeping kosher? Therefore is it not time to open the issue of porging, which may assist not only in reducing the cost, but allow the use of the hind-quarter meat that is available abroad? Edward Pearlman pearlman@pearlman.karoo.co.uk