A lot of us have encountered the word “halal” on food tags and restaurants, but not all of us know what it really means. Our Muslim friends base their choice on this term because it indicates what is permitted for them to purchase or consume. For a country that has citizens with mixed religious affiliations, that term is just as critical.
Muslims in Islamic nations don’t have troubles eating in halal eateries and picking up halal products as most likely than not, they are halal-certified. But for those who are in areas that have various religious groups, halal is not as rampant as they would like. Good thing that more establishments are now becoming aware of their customer’s preferences.
Halal means lawful or legal. If a food label has this word on or a restaurant alleges they are halal-certified, it means that the preparation of their food is in accordance with the Islamic dietary law, and hence, they are allowed to consume the items.
Just what are allowed in Islamic law? For meat products, the mode in which an animal should be slaughtered must be swift. When slaughtering an animal, its windpipe and gullet must be cut and done quickly.
And because there are halal or permitted items, there are also haraam or forbidden products. To start with, Muslims are not allowed to feed on pork and drink intoxicants. So a product or a restaurant must not add those ingredients to their menu. There should also be no contamination of the items, meaning, if a utensil has been used to prepare a pork meal, it should not be utilized anymore to prepare a halal-approved item.
Other haraam items include blood, carnivores or birds of prey, animals butchered in the name of any other god but Allah or have been sacrificed to another god, and corpse of an animal.
Halal-certified restaurants should conform to the Islamic dietary laws. And because some items are hard to determine whether they are halal or not, there are Muslim groups who certify food items as halal for consumers. Those products with halal certification are used as ingredients by halal eateries, just to make very sure that they are rigorously following the laws.
It’s good to know that there are restaurants not run by Muslims that still make a great effort to adhere to Islamic dietary laws. It merely means that they respect all their customers and honor their preferences and faiths.
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