Should you be told if the meat you're served is halal?

[YouWillNeverGuessMyUsername]

If you go to a restaurant or cafe or cafeteria at work or whatever. Would you expect to be informed that they were serving halal meat?

don’t understand how ‘90% of halal meat isn’t slaughtered according to halal rules, as some are saying on here

No, people are saying 90% of Halal meat comes from animals pre-stunned before slaughter.

Kosher meat can not be pre-stunned before death.

So I guess if the complaint relates to animal welfare then kosher meat should trigger significantly more concern.

So I guess this doesnt relate to animal welfare.

Do you never eat in an Indian restaurant or have a takeaway?

I assume that anyone who needed to know, would ask.

I don’t understand how ‘90% of halal meat isn’t slaughtered according to halal rules, as some are saying on here. Is that because Muslim own abattoirs so they do halal and non-halal meat?

It is slaughtered according to Halal rules. It’s just that Halal slaughter doesn’t necessarily forbid stunning the animal. As long as the animal is not killed by the stun prior to the sticking slaughter process. Some Islamic sections do prohibit it though which is why 80-90% of Halal meat has been stunned prior to slaughter.
Kosher practices however do prohibit stunning prior to slaughter as the animal has to be conscious.

And I certainly don’t rule out Islamophobia in the frequency with which this issue is raised but I would also imagine it is true to say that there are far more Muslims than observant Jews in the UK so Halal is more common/prevalent than Kosher.

@ZookeeperSE On threads like this someone will have the stats about Kosher meat only really being sold in Kosher butchers, restaurants etc unlike halal meat which can be imported, exported etc

I think we should all know exactly where our meat has come from and how it was slaughtered. Halal or kosher or just dead dead.

I guess the only difference between the two that end up debated is one you’ve got to actually look for the other seems to be everywhere more of an actively avoid.

Religion of a small number of people overall shouldn’t change the food of the majority.

In England and wales in 2021 Muslims made up 6.5% of the population. Jewish people 0.5%. Sikhs 0.8% and Christians 46.2%.

I can’t say I’ve ever accidentally stumbled into a kosher restaurant or ordered a kosher take away. My children’s school don’t serve kosher meat. But I think I’d struggle to find a non halal take away on just eat, and apart from a Jewish school I reckon I’d struggle to find one again that doesn’t serve Halal meat.

I don't believe it has changed my food. The animal is stunned. I have zero interest in what a sound system is playing at the time of death.

Non stun (this isn’t all Halal meat) slaughter is proven to be a cruel and prolonged process, involving significant fear and suffering. It should never be on any menu. The fact that ritual slaughter exemptions even exist is a stain on humanity.

Sorry but this isn’t true. In 2024, only about 88% of Halal slaughtered animals were pre stunned, which means that hundreds of thousands of individual animals were not.
With some other slaughter methods, eg Kosher, none of the animals are pre stunned.
It is hell for animals

Maybe she things it'll make her muslim?

Ok i guess you think that for all meat ?

The fact that animal slaughter exists is a stain on humanity.

Not as funny as you think. As a PP has already mentioned ordering a sausage butty and getting halal chicken sausage so I would also think it possible that some establishments will serve halal turkey bacon as a standard bacon sandwich.

Which is why it’s just common sense in a world where a bag of nuts needs to state “may contain nuts” that Halal, kosher and any other sky 🧚 killed meat should be labelled as such to prevent both the racism towards groups along with cringe inducing virtue signalling. That are both on this thread.

Yes most pizza places here don’t have bacon at all or it’s turkey bacon but often not specified and still just called bacon.

Agree fully that this is often thinly disguised Islamophobia or at the very least unconscious bias by focusing on the stun/non-stun factor of slaughter to the exclusion of every other factor contributing to a so-called 'humane' slaughter.

Given what you say about your experience with a non-stunned slaughter, why is kosher slaughter is 'far more' problematic to you?

Despite the ignorance from some posters, this is an interesting thread.

I’ve learnt a few things today. I did know that most meat in restaurants and takeaways is halal anyway, and I have no issue with that.

You don't have any Chinese, Korean, Japanese or bog standard chippies in your Just Eat delivery area?

Bit hard to get halal pork balls, curry sauce and chips. And that saveloy definitely hasn't had somebody performing Du'a over the constituent parts before assembly.

I don't understand how meat eaters are upset by the concept of kosher or halal meat.
All the animals are killed - they're still going to suffer to satisfy peoples palates.
There is a lot of misinformation about how food gets from field to table, particularly with regard to animal products.
I can understand if someone wanted to know for the purposes of religious observation, but equally people are very misinformed about what " Halal" means. Bread is halal, water is halal, fruit is halal, but people don't seem to realise that; they think it only applies to meat.

Oh come on now. You do care. You want people to be up in arms about those darned Muslims and their forrin ways. You’ll be most unimpressed if they don’t start jumping up and down and insisting that proper food be served, won’t you?

This.

Makes me laugh

I did forget about the Chinese 😅 my bad. Though the first one I did just click doesn’t do pork balls. No Korean or Japanese on there from a quick look.

But most of our locals on just eat are burger, kebab, pizza, chicken shop type. I’d struggle to find any of those that’s not halal, the local curry place is halal.

My chippy isn’t on Justeat as they object to it. Lovely chippy mind.

People will say they are animal lovers , they’ll then try to justify their choice to eat meat, talk about good and bad slaughter practices etc etc but it’s still killing a living creature. I know someone who claims to care deeply about animals as they have lots of cats and dogs but they aren’t vegetarian so I said ‘you’re a pet lover NOT an animal lover’ !

No, only if you ask.

I'm not religious in any sense so it makes bugger all difference to me how an animal is slaughtered.

As long as it's done as humanely as possible, I don't care if it's kosher, halal, or A N Other.

Many larger scale British abattoirs now slaughter to halal standards purely because it greatly increases the market they can sell to. And similarly many places buy halal meat for the same reason. It's a sensible business decision.

If you object to it I think the onus is on you to seek out meat slaughtered in your preferred manner. Odds are you've eaten quite a lot of halal meat to date with no ill-effects, however.