Vinegar was made by mixing barley with wine, or soured wine was used.
The prohibition expressed in the ninth chapter of Genesis against animal
blood as an article of diet was repeated with detailed instructions in
Leviticus. Instead of devoting a large amount of space to recounting the
regulations there expressed, it will perhaps be better to make only a
general classification of them.
There were interdicted: _Sheretz haaretz_, creeping things; _sheretz
haof_, winged insects, with the exception of the fully developed locust;
of _sheretz hamayim_, creatures dwelling in water, those which were not
provided with fins and scales; of the feathered species those which were
not furnished by nature with the implements with which to clean
themselves; of the quadrupeds and animals of the chase those that did
not chew the cud or were not provided with split hoofs.
The fat parts of animals were also reserved for the altar and temple
offerings.
Special interdictions were announced against dead or injured animals;
though these did not extend to strangers. In the New Testament, these
laws are also mentioned as applying to healthy animals that had been
strangled or killed in any manner other than that prescribed.
In a word, the Mosaic laws prohibited the use of any flesh that was
diseased, bruised or rendered unwholesome by the presence of too much
blood and also of the flesh of animals that were not cleanly in habits,
diet or body.
Oxen were not eaten when older than three years.
It is not necessary to give here the oft-repeated methods of Jewish
butchery, as they have been of late so frequently described--and highly
endorsed--by medical and scientific men.
Fresh fish (eaten generally broiled) appears to have been the principal
article of diet in the environs of the Sea of Galilee. The Jews,
however, were not well versed in the character of the different species.
They roughly classed them as big, small, clean and unclean.
Salt fish also was imported into Jerusalem.
Locusts were considered to be but meagre fare, but they were eaten
salted, dried and roasted with butter in a pan.
An ordinary kitchen was equipped with a range, a heavy caldron, a large
fork or flesh hook, a wide, open metal vessel for heating water, etc.,
two or more earthenware pots and numerous dishes.
The kid, lamb or calf, killed on the advent of a holiday or in honor of
a guest, would sometimes be roasted or baked whole, but it was usually
cut up and boiled in a caldron filled with water or milk and set over a
wood fire, the scum being taken off from time to time and salt and
spices added.
The meat and broth were served up separately or together as desire might
dictate.
The principal meal was held in the early evening, although occasionally
noon was chosen for a big banquet.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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