Is Vegan Meat Kosher And Halal?

The mainstreaming of Impossible, Beyond, and other meat alternatives has raised new questions: health questions, business questions, and now, religious questions. For people who adhere to religious dietary guidelines, it's not entirely clear how these non-meat meats should be categorized. Thankfully, The Washington Post reported a piece that attempts to sort the kosher from the treif.

The piece talks to religious-food authorities from the Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu faiths about whether such meat alternatives would be permissable for religiously observant eaters. (The question of whether Catholics would have reservations about eating, say, an Impossible Whopper on a Lenten Friday is raised, but not answered.)

While the answers may seem cut and dry—sure, of course, it's not an animal, so why would certain prohibitions apply?—it's not that simple.

"You may speak with three different rabbis and get 25 different opinions," Rabbi Eli Lando of OK Kosher tells the Post. The considerations raised in the piece are fascinating, even if you're not religious yourself. Go ahead and give The Washington Post's piece its hard-earned click.