SC - Kosher Plants Hygienic, HAH!

[Michael Newton]

- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Siegfried Heydrich" <baronsig at peganet.com>
To: <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2000 7:29 AM
Subject: Re: SC - Getting people to eat period food


>     Yes, when we think of Kosher, Kasher is normally what springs to mind.
> What's interesting are the number of people who think that the practice is
> cruel, somehow. Certainly no worse than non-kosher slaughterhouses, and
> certainly a lot more hygienic. The Rabbis answer to a higher authority
than
> USDA inspectors . . .
>
>     Sieggy
>
Excuse me, but now you're in my territory. . .

As a U.S.D.A. inspector working at a kosher plant, I can firmly tell you
this is a lot of bull. The Rabbis are not looking for either cleanliness or
disease in animals; what they are looking at is the intestines and organs to
see if, after slaughter, the animal still measures up to being considered
Kosher. While the obvious things such as abscesses rule out kosher , others
such as malignant lymphoma (which is a instant condemnable situation)
are not _even_ looked for by the rabbis. In addition, Kosher plants have
government waivers on certain areas. For example, on the poultry slaughter
floor, birds are cold-picked instead of scalded because the rabbis insist
that no heat is applied while the animal is on the kill floor. This is why
the Kosher plants have exemptions for feathers left on the birds until they
reach some parts of processing (and at our plant, sometimes, not even then).
As to kosher plants being more hygienic than non, YOU HAVE GOT TO BE
KIDDING! Both the pork plant in Waterloo, IA (when I did my pork inspection
training) and the turkey plant across the tracks are infinity more hygienic
than the post I'm currently posted at.
(I would be rolling on the floor, laughing at this if it wasn't such a
serious subject)

Lady Beatrix of Tanet
(Inspector Newton, FSIS)