The rapid development of these technologies has resulted in a lack of consensus within religious communities regarding the place of alternative protein products, Kalman said. He fears that this disagreement could result in additional rifts within the Jewish community, with some households deeming these products acceptable and others finding them to be unkosher. While certifying organizations like the OU will play a role in these intercommunal negotiations, many of the decisions will be made on an individual basis.
Most observant Muslims have decided against eating the alternative protein, citing Islam’s firm ban on pork. “Anything that sounds like pork, looks like pork, or tastes like pork we avoid,” said Bassem Chaaban, who leads an Isamic community organization in Florida. However, some younger Muslims said they’re willing to try it. “I don’t have a problem with veggie sausages, so I wouldn’t see a huge issue with it,” said Raheela Shah, a career advisor in London. “I mean, we need to consume less meat anyway.”
Several religious Jews noted that existing fake bacon products already have a hechsher, making debate about Impossible Pork irrelevant to them. “I wouldn’t get upset if someone served it to me, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to find it,” said Ed Bromberg, a retired research scientist from Dr. Phillips, Florida. Emily Birnbaum, a doctoral student at the Graduate Center at the City University of New York, said she has no issue with eating Impossible Pork since she has already been eating fake sausage products. “I didn’t particularly like the sausage, but that’s because it was spicy,” she added.
Still, the discourse surrounding fake meat products reflects the core purpose of religious practices like halal and kashrut: to find a path to modernity through debate and discussion. “These are rules made on the go. It’s the nature of Islamic law throughout history—they’re based on constant negotiations between people,” said Ergene, the co-author of Halal Food: A History and a professor of history at the University of Vermont. Kalman said the same is true of Judaism. “Kashrut is one of the most sophisticated ways that Jews have engaged with technology in the 21st century and 20th century,” he said.
The best way to understand how these negotiations play out in the modern world is to look at large catering events, according to Regenstein, the Cornell professor. He pointed to the process of normalizing margarine as an example of how a religious community could navigate the introduction of a new food. When the butter alternative first appeared on the market in the early 1900s, it would be served at kosher events with its wrapper visible. That way, religious Jews knew that margarine wasn’t actually dairy and could be eaten with meat. Over the intervening century, though, the wrapper was slowly removed from under the margarine, as diners began to accept that meat dinners would only ever come with a yellow block of oil, salt, and water.
