Kosher Foods - Blood

Blood

One of the main biblical food laws forbids eating blood on account of "the life in the blood". This ban and reason are listed in the Noahide Laws and twice in Leviticus as well as in Deuteronomy. The Priestly Code also prohibits the eating of certain types of fat (chelev) from sacrificial land animals (cattle, sheep, and goats), since the fat is the portion of the meat exclusively allocated to God (by burning it on the altar).

The classical rabbis argued that, in a number of cases, only if it is impossible to remove every drop of blood, the prohibition against consuming blood was impractical, and there should be rare exceptions: they claimed that consuming the blood which remained on the inside of meat (as opposed to the blood on the surface of it, dripping from it, or housed within the veins) should be permitted and that the blood of fish and locusts could also be consumed.

To comply with this prohibition, a number of preparation techniques became practiced within traditional Judaism. The main technique, known as melihah, involves the meat being soaked in water for about half an hour, which opens pores. After this, the meat is placed on a slanted board or in a wicker basket, and is thickly covered with salt on each side, then left for between 20 minutes and one hour. The salt covering draws blood from the meat by osmosis, and the salt must be subsequently removed from the meat (usually by trying to shake most of it off and then washing the meat twice) to complete the extraction of the blood.

Melihah is not sufficient to extract blood from the liver, lungs, heart, and certain other internal organs, since they naturally contain a high density of blood, and therefore these organs are usually removed before the rest of the meat is salted. Roasting, on the other hand, discharges blood while cooking, and is the usual treatment given to these organs. It is also an acceptable method for removing blood from all meat.