Inside Israel Today: Why Would a Jew Eat a Bug?

I try to eat it straight and I was on camera I put it in my mouth and I ended up spitting it out you're listening to inside Israel today with your Hoffman on the land of Israel Network hello and welcome to inside Israel today here on the land of Israel Network on the land of israel Tom I am here still giddy this morning from where I went last night last night I had the honor and the privilege of being the representative of The Jerusalem Post at the feast of exotic curiosities that took place at the biblical Museum of Natural History which is in Beit Shemesh a quaint sunny town about an hour and a half away from Jerusalem with traffic and I'm told 25 minutes when there's not and it was this amazing meal that was put together by the head of the museum professor Nathan Slifkin in which we ate extraordinary food we will soon speak to him on the line but first I will read you from the menu so you can be jealous we had appetizers of a smoked King clip fish brought from South Africa we had what is termed kosher oysters with pearls and we will discuss with the rabbi what we mean by that we had fried kosher bacon and eggs and again it was discussed the rabbi what we mean by that we had a salad of the seven species of the Bible we ate a pasty ax pastry with dried fruit carrot cream and pheasant we had figs stuffed with Muscovy duck we had slow-cooked utters in an almond milk we had a mokuba which is a potato rice or wheat and meat dish there was with the meat being guinea fowl and we had roasted water buffalo asian water buffalo with festive rice and for dessert we had crispy fried locusts and sugar all this prepared the best chef in Israel Moshe Besson from the best restaurant in Jerusalem eucalyptus which is located across from the old city walls of Jerusalem where I had the honor and privilege of getting married and so we have on the line to fell and tell us the background of these wonderful foods rabbi Slifkin good morning and welcome to inside Israel today here on the land of Israel Network good morning great to be on the show okay so please give us some background why did we have this wonderful meal last night well we opened the biblical Museum of Natural History three years ago and last year we had the idea of celebrating our second anniversary with a feast of biblical flora and fauna foods from foods from the Bible that are not normally eaten today like quails and goats and deer and so on and so last year we did biblical foods this year we wanted to do something a little different so we decided to do unusual kosher foods that are not in the Bible and indeed they were very special I actually want to start out if I'm going to be asking you about a series of different foods I want to ask you about the one item that you told us it's not necessarily kosher which we had available to take home which is a little bit of coffee beans in a little jar that is supposed to be the most expensive coffee in the world in the heart because it has been swallowed digested and excreted by an animal all the Asian Palm Civet ladies tell us about this so the the civet is a it's a mammal that looks kind of like a cross between a cat and a mongoose and it's claimed that the the coffee beans that they excrete are improved by the digestive enzymes that they absorb while passing through the digestive tract to the Pacific so the question is there is it kosher normally a food product of a non kosher animal is itself not kosher but this isn't exactly necessarily a product of the civet it's a coffee bean that's just been you know slightly slightly altered so it's it's not entirely clear if it's kosher or not it's not exactly a question that's been studied a lot massara unlike the other things in the menu we didn't feel comfortable saying definitively that it's kosher which is why we gave it in take-home packets with instructions to ask your local off doc sorry I will indeed be asking my local Orthodox rabbi I have presented it to my wife who graciously allowed me to leave home to a ten a seven-hour meal that was preceded by an hour and a half drive to beit shemesh so but let's work backward i must confess i i loved everything at the meal except for a couple things that maybe we'll start with to get them out of the way okay i couldn't do it in the locust come on out a meal similar to this about eight years ago I didn't back consume a locust that was wrapped in a Buffalo kind of cold cut right whereas this one I try to eat it straight and I was on camera which I think may be added to the tension I put in my mouth and I ended up spitting it out yeah locust also it was tremendously difficult but you ate it right oh yeah not my favorite wasn't my first locust and why would anyone eat a bug rabbi well in a few reasons in antiquity when if you have a plague of locusts wiping out everything so are you gonna eat locust rod and staff to death so it's very nutritious more easily you know it's a cultural thing in in many African countries it's considered to be a delicacy you know it's the the bamboo the Bisley of these countries and in the future they say that it's as the world population increases it's going to be exceedingly difficult to produce protein from from cows and chickens yeah which are not a very economically effective so they say the insect protein is gonna be the future that is the future you heard it here first ladies and gentlemen now the only other item that I tried that I did not like and a fellow land of Israel Network host Eve Harrow also said this she was not a fan of it was the slow-cooked utters in almond milk yeah I will confess that I had a hard time with that one to now but this is special you're eating meat in milk together yeah which is Judaism normally does not allow why does it allow us to eat a nutter well the law is you have to squeeze out the milk of it first which was done when it was prepared that there is apparently a certain taste of milk still residual at there in the other yeah the idea is that as we discussed last night that for everything that's not kosher there is a coach equivalent so a couple of the items on the menu were echoing that idea hence we had the the meat and milk which was the others that we had the the bacon substitute and we had the the kosher oysters okay so the bacon substitute as long as we're going out of order here which is fine well tell her our listeners here what that was so that was something called dulse it's an algae d UL se so it's a kind of a kind of seaweed which is a druid in color so when you fry it it looks kind of like bacon and apparently it even tastes like they can never I wasn't making myself I can't attest to that there is a person who was at my table yeah who will go nameless who has eaten bacon in her life and she said that you did a good job in recreating the taste really interesting okay okay ask it's a no so yeah so that was the bacon and then the others now the the oyster was very special I brought home to my daughter the most beautiful oyster shell that there was the fact that you served something resembling an oyster which was a noise or mushroom gnaw on an oyster shell it was very special in area anesthetic how can we eat off an oyster shell and it seems to be the most uncommon thing possible right so the reason is there's often a lot of surprises when you study the laws of kashrut and because the shell is not considered to be part of the flesh of the oyster and not considered to be no the food product with the oyster so there's nothing wrong with the shell you can eat food off oyster shells as long as they're cleaned and as you noticed last night we also had ground-up moister shell available to sprinkle on it you can you can eat the oyster shell it's sold sometimes as a calcium supplement and it's perfectly legitimate to eat it did you sprinkle any oyster shell powder on you always did indeed and I enjoyed it very much great now this was served together with one other appetizer which is a king clip fish yeah the woman who takes care of my children when I'm off here working is from South Africa ah and she was very impressed she said that the king clip is a very appreciated where she comes from in Durban the coastal city there in South Africa how did you get it and how do we know that the king clip is kosher so the king clip is I only known people in the extreme southern hemisphere you're any gonna it's only going to be South Africans and Australians who are familiar with it and when it was Oh the thing is for a fish to be kosher fish has to have fins and scales now these scales and a king clip are very hard to find and at beneath a layer of mucus and the scales are very very thin transparent so originally the king click was thought to be not kosher and then when they found the scales it was accepted as being kosher which was you know a delight for Jews in South Africa because it's such a delicacy there and then what happened is that when people first brought it to Israel people try to claim their then that it's not a kosher fish because they couldn't find the scales and they made a huge kosher controversy what happened in the end was many rabbis in Israel declaring it not kosher but there in South Africa still insisting that it is kosher in the rabbi's in South Africa were the experts on the rabbis in Israel weren't as familiar with correct correct mm-hmm but in the end they found a compromise the compromise was that the rabbi's knew Israel declared it kosher but not kosher not Manhattan not strictly kosher rights which would mean that some people would eat it and some people still would not right and the South Africans basically went along with it kind of surrendering to the bigger rabbis over here in Israel right but all the other rabbis in South Africa still know as far as I know they all still eat it quite happily that's good and I ate it quite happily rabbi mm-hmm okay so in the in the next course we had when people go to eucalyptus which really is a great restaurant hmm two of the highlights that they have there are pass Tia and stuffed figs mm-hmm now when you go there normally that pass Tia and those figs are stuffed with either chicken or beef the most common right animals that we eat but at this meal the figs were stuffed with Muscovy duck mm-hmm and he pass Tia was filled with pheasant right the pheasant is a very expensive bird they're very special they're very valiant honorable bird having this pheasant at her meal was very special you're talking about the F&T weight or the life hasn't that we owe that we bought so hounds I mean I actually saw a live Muscovy duck earlier in the day I took my daughter to a local petting zoo and the same colored duck came up to her at the play area great and they're they're so interesting book ends in one day all right so it was fastened there's a lot of birds that are like kosher but we shall not normally eat them you know in today's industrialized society we just detail you know chickens and cows but there are traditions certainly other birds are kosher - and no traditions that were in danger of dying out so it's important to keep these traditions alive which is why we wanted to serve the pheasant you know a very expensive expensive bird not normally you know practical to farm and for people to eat but a bird that nonetheless you know there's a strong historical tradition that it is a kosher bird now you can tell us about this disaster that you have yes of the meal involving the fuzzy yes so I can say you know we acquired some pheasants at great expense and one of the many animals that we have at the biblical Museum of Natural History is a karate a karate is isn't there a family from South America and this particular karate was found wandering around Jerusalem someone's illegally held the exotic pet that had escaped and the nature of Zoar thoroughly asked us if we take it in which we did it kind of fits into one of the themes we teach at the Museum in the museum we focused on teaching about how the animals of the Bible are the animals of the Land of Israel you know not the animals from other parts of the world it's the animals of biblical lands but it's the animals of the Land of Israel and biblical times which is lions cheetahs crocodiles hippos and so on not the animals you'll find in Israel today which is cats and Myna birds and Australian parakeets and a lot of introduced species including the occasional karate so we have this karate she's a fantastic animal and he saw it when we brought her in last night personality but she does have a taste for peasants and she's somehow managed to stick her arms out through a cage grab a couple of the pheasants and decapitate them that makes them not kosher doesn't it right yes it does make not kosher so the meal even more expensive yes we have to quickly uh you know search around Israel fine to find somebody who could sell us some more pheasants how did this was a fundraiser for your museum something to do you know something to do for publicity the educational value of it and so on did you make money off this meal not why not well one thing it perhaps made a little money is that they did auction off an item is probably the most surprising thing for me of last night I had never known and I've gone to meals like this to one me like this before I had never known that the Piranha is a kosher fish right so what we found when it when we give tours at the Museum is everyone expects you know we have it as he saw we have a you know a piranha and exhibit and everyone expects it to be not kosher because they see it after having gone to the exhibits of the kosher status of mammals and birds well with mammals and birds you see very clearly the Predators are not kosher so people assume that the same is true with fish but it's really not the case the fish to be kosher it just has to have fins and scales and and the reason why there's no concept with fish of Prayer that's as being not kosher is that almost every fish in the world as a predator what else they eat not much plant life in the ocean so you know in a tuna tuna fish which people think is this you know innocent little little round fish that nibbles of grass you know it's not it's a gigantic the relations predator so efficient you know the only reason why sharks are not kosher is that they don't have scales nothing to do with their being creditors so a piranha is in fact kosher so last night this piranha was auctioned off it wasn't enough for everyone it was quite a small fish and different attending the meal competed in an auction and a fellow from New York named Harris back purchased this piranha for $1,500 and enjoyed it with his wife mm-hmm and afterward they said when I asked them how it was but after they said it was good they said it tasted like any other fish you know you purchase a fish for $1,500 I would think you would have to say even if it wasn't even even if it really did taste like any other fried fish lie okay say it was the best fish I've ever had in my life and I got to eat it and you didn't get to eat it and I'm special you're not but these are unique in the Civic comes from saying that you ate a piranha exactly now I want to ask a dude behind the scenes was their second piranha that you ate nope no but they did give me a very kindly a little bit of s I got to taste it yes very good and how did you think about the fish but it was it better than any fish you ever had in your life you have to realize I'm from Manchester so I have a pretty bland palate so I go made any experiences I kind of wasted on me Wow so I want to give you an opportunity here now that we've gone through oh wait wait wait wait save the best for last the best item served at this meal was the roasted Asian water buffalo yes and a chef D chef Moshe Pistone carried out this Buffalo not a large turkey before when albums video other people he had out yes he carried it out on a tray there's a few other people like he's in a stretcher yeah and then carved it with love mm-hmm on and what was not a table it was a Python cage well it was a table it was a display cabinet that's been in the last few weeks we had to turn into a Python cage because the Python had outgrown his regular cage okay good to know the background there but to witness this Buffalo being carved above a Python was certainly an experience of a lifetime he also noticed a buffalo on the wall overlooking it I did not notice that there was a buffalo over the wall there was a hippopotamus skull yes to the carving Buffalo on the wall even better and then eating it Wow even though I was already quite full by that eat this is a delicious delicious animal right this just straighten out a misconception that some people had this was on a buffalo that was captured from the wild there are some buffaloes in the saloon Nature Reserve but this Buffalo is one that was raised in a farm this is work there's one more shot in Israel where they raise Buffalo for their milk products so I was a farm buffalo farm blower you know as someone who celebrates Thanksgiving both American and Canadian Thanksgiving even though I'm not Canadian and even though most Canadian Jews do not celebrate the Canadian Thanksgiving I do I think that there ought to be one day a year where everyone gets together over a buffalo and thanks God for creating such a delicious and beautiful animal so now that we've gone through the whole menu I want to give you a chance to plug your museum rabbi this is a very unique place if you could make the way all the way to beit shemesh and I've exaggerated a little bit in how long it takes to get that they've built a road that's now much faster it used to be I'm told even harder to get there but those of you who can make your way out to isolated beit shemesh tell them about your museum okay so firstly obviously is not so isolated I don't know why it took you so long it takes me only 40 minutes to get to Jerusalem you know we have that you out there from the main highway so the museum we display the animals of the Bible a combination of live animals and taxidermy it's a guided tour and it enables people to get a full understanding and to really get open up close and personal all the animals you get to handle lots of different exotic animals it's a very you know unique aspect of Jewish identity you normally see Jewish identity in terms of you know synagogue prayers things like that you don't think of it in terms of hyenas and crocodiles and pythons so the museum we we presented vividly that's also an aspect of Jewish identity lots to learn about the animal kingdom in the exotic members of the animal kingdom and people loved it thank god we've had 30,000 visitors so far we also offer now online class tours of the museum for people who want to able to attend in person people aboard online how do they get your website through groups I have synagogue groups and so on in the United States will arrange live online classes from the museum museum's website is www.logfurnitureplace.com aus for but that's what it is Biblical Natural History and I gives more details about the different types of programs we do at the Museum I certainly recommend learning about the biblical natural history of Israel learning I learned a lot last night from you and from the whole presentation I didn't know that this year besides being the anniversary a hundred years since the Balfour Declaration is also a hundred year anniversary since Israel's last bear mm-hmm people that realize what kind of animals used to live in Israel you know you had lions yeah up until the early 20th century there were ostrich is there were bears that were cheetahs there's still a couple of hyenas on leopards left in Israel this is part of the biblical wildlife well-being from Chicago I'm a Bears fan and I don't know when they had errors in Chicago and right now the Bears are not very good but I will always appreciate a bear and certainly a Cub rabbi thank you so much for coming here on inside Israel today on the Land of Israel network on the Land of Israel calm okay thank you very much it was great being on the show pleasure and listeners thank you for being a part of a great show here where we learned about the exotic curiosities and were served last night at the biblical Museum of Natural History I encourage you to go to that website to Biblical Natural History org and if when you're in Israel include that on the itinerary of your tours of this wonderful land perhaps one of the hosts here on the Land of Israel Network Eve Harrow is she's a great tour guide she can it you can book her as your tour guide on a trip and she can take you to the biblical Museum of Natural History and the folks behind these Messara meals they're called meals that try to keep alive the traditions of the special meals of the special animals that we've been eating over time ah Reserva Tomsky a professor from bar-ilan university and re greenspan and this from jerusalem they're planning another one next summer and being a part of me like this is the experience of a lifetime so listeners thank you for being a part of this and if you want to see my experience crying PETA locust last night you can go to the Land of Israel calm website it's there laugh at me it's okay however wonderful day from here in Jerusalem