suitable for vegetarians

Assalam O Alaikum Br. SherKhan,

The two ulema we consult are Sunni Hanafi ulema educated in Faqi school in India their names are listed on our website.


Syed Rasheeduddin Ahmed
www.muslimconsumergroup.com
www.canadianhalalfoods.com

 

JazakAllah for your reply!

 

Assalam O Alaikum Br. SherKhan,

Thanks for asking questions. "Suitable for vegetarian" is the label put by the food manufacturer not a vegan organization, if it was a vegan organization, they will inspect source of each ingredient then certified as "Suitable for Vegetarian".

Whey with suitable for vegetarian indicate that they used microbial rennet not animal rennet. I also think they use milk sourced starter culture bacteria. The media upon these starter culture grows is made of milk, suitable for vegetarian whey and lactose. The question comes if they use any autolyzed yeast extract from brewer's yeast, if not then the whey suitable for vegetrain can be consumed by Muslims. Because suitable for vegetarian label includes alcohol, wine vinegar, alcohol in the natural or artificial flavor, autolyzed yeast obtained as by-product of beer making. These ingredients do not have any impact on "Suitable for Vegetarian". Vegetarians drink alcoholic beverages. It is for sure that no animal derived ingredients are used in food products labeled as "Suitable for Vegetarian". So the ingredients of starter culture media has to be known for the whey suitable for vegetarian. If you have a product containing whey under suitable for vegetarian label then you have to contact the manufacturer for the ingredients of starter culture media.

It is in the literature that UK Govt. applied excise tax on all imported Naturally Brewed Soy sauce because presence of 2-3% alcohol. Most of the Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia, Malaysia and Indonesia consider a food product Halal even if alcohol is used as a solvent in natural or artificial flavor. I do not know whether the Naturally Brewed Soya Sauce has been Halal certified by Council of Indonesia Ulema (MIU). Naturally brewed soya sauce is a product of soybean, wheat by mould, yeast and lactic acid bacteria fermentation. In some, wheat may not used. The only Halal Soya Sauce is all purpose soya sauce made with
water, salt, hydrolyzed soya protein, corn syrup and benzoate. All chinese foods are made with naturally brewed soy sauce which provides flavor.
Any Soya Sauce which is labeled as Naturally Brewed Sauce is not Halal even if it has a Halal symbol on it. Because there are many Ulema in UK, South Africa, Malaysia, Indonesia allow Muslims to consume food products if they are made from alcohol containing flavors or contain small amount of alcohol if the alcohol is obtained other than grape and date. This is probably the reason of having Halal label on the Indonesian made naturally brewed soya sauce. They do not consider alcohol obtained from soybean and wheat flour is as Qamer. Our organization do not follow the views of above ulema. We believe based on the opinions of our ulema that ethyl alcohol from any source causes intoxication, so it is Haram beacuse according a Hadith any intoxicant is Haram.

Syed Rasheeduddin Ahmed
www.muslimconsumergroup.com
www.canadianhalalfoods.com

 

Soy Sauce - Halal or Haraam

brother Rasheeduddin,

I would appreciate if you can throw some light of halal nature of soy sauce currently available in the UK market.

I understand that you have published a well-researched article on this topic. Guided primarily by your research, I started avoiding the naturally-brewed soy sauce that are usually retailed in the UK market. Only once did I manage to locate a 'Made in Philippines' soy sauce which was free of wheat and salt and wasn't naturally brewed (and had a "halal" label). Unfortunately that product got stocked out soon from the local retailer's shelf.

Recently, I have started noticing naturally-brewed halal soy sauce on the market shelves. As I understand, a naturally-brewed soy sauce is haraam; so I am unsure what is prompting the manufacturers to label such products are "halal".

Take for example the following product available in the market:

Brand: Sinsin - Superior Dark Soy Sauce (Naturally Brewed)
Mfd.: Under license of Heinz Sinsin
Country: Made in Indonesia
Label: Halal
Ingredients: Water, Soya Beans, Salt, Sugar, Wheat Flour, Caramel, Preservatives (E211), Spices, Citric Acid (E330)

Is the above product mis-specified as 'halal'? Could the manufacturer be simply misleading the consumers (either due to their own ignorance or perversely by design)? Can a naturally-brewed soy sauce be 'halal'?

I have also noticed another Guangdong (China) manufactured soy sauce, which is also naturally-brewed and at same time carries a 'halal' label.

I would appreciate your clarifications on this issue.

 

I stand corrected. I meant to talk about use of rennet but instead wrongly made reference to alcohol. JazakAllah for correction.

I'm glad that you have been visiting this forum since I had few questions to ask you. I will post few more queries later tonight for clarification on soya sauce.


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Use of "V" symbol with Whey product:

I have seen a number of products in UK mentioning whey as one of the ingredients, while at the same time displaying "Suitable for Vegetarian" symbol for the overall product.

Is it safe to consume such products where the whey, in particular, is not specified to be from vegetarian source? Can I trust the general product label and assume that the consituent whey is also halal/vegetarian? What do you think the general industry practice is (i.e. when a product is claimed to be "suitable for vegetarian", can we safely assume that each and every constituent ingredient is also halal)?

I am more comfortable using Iceland (a UK food retailer) food products, since they specify the vegetarian source of each and every ingredient. For example, whey would be specifically labelled as "vegetarian whey (from vegetarian rennet)". Am I being paranoid in not using whey-based products unless they have been specifically classified as vegetarian (as in the case of Iceland)?

 

Alcohol in Whey

Assalam O Alaikum Br. SherKhan,

I would like to make a correction about your statement"whey (alcohol used during processing of whey)". Alcohol is not used in the manufacture of whey. Whey is a by-product of cheese making or liquid left after milk is curd or coagulated by rennet enzyme. The Halal requirements of whey and cheese is given under Ingredients section of our website www.muslimconsumergroup.com .
There are few requirements for Halal whey, starter culture bacteria is added first to milk for flavor and texture of cheese. If these bacteria are source from milk then they are Halal but if they are sourced from meat then they are not Halal. The media upon which these bacteria grows in millions has to be Halal. A media could be 100% milk or combination of milk, whey, lactose and autolyzed yeast(from brewer's yeast for beer making). If they use 100% milk or Halal whey, Halal lactose and Halal autolyzed yeast(from baker's yeast) then the media is considered Halal. If the rennet is from microbial source or yeast cells then rennet is Halal(Haram if from pork stomach and not Halal from nonzabiha cow). So the bacteria is added to milk then rennet is added, the milk became coagulated. Then whey is drained, collected and spray dried to make dried whey powder. This is also called sweet whey which is mostly used in other food products. The coagulated milk is further process to make cheese. Acid whey is made from the acid cheese such as cottage cheese where no rennet is used but an acid is used to coagulate the milk but before that starter culture bacteria is added like in regular cheese production. Acid whey powder is very rarley used in other food products because of its acid taste.

Syed Rasheeduddin Ahmed
www.muslimconsumergroup.com
www.canadianhalalfoods.com

 

If there is a "V" sign, then you need not check specifically for lard, gelatin etc., since they are from animal sources. You still need to check for alcohol, alcohol-based ingredients like whey, soy sauce, vanilla etc.

I forgot to inform earlier that vanilla or vanillin is mostly extracted using alcohol. So do avoid vanilla based products (mostly chocolates, ice creams, biscuits, cakes etc.). In UK, TRS and Foster Clark specifically sell non-alcohol based vanilla essence. But one can never know the source of vanilla used in the food products.

 

Here's what I do normally when selecting foodstuff in UK.

1. Check first for the "suitable for vegetarian" symbol. As Aqdas pointed that is not proof enough for the foodstuff being halal. It still helps when "E" numbers are not very descriptive. For example, E471(emulsifiers), unless specified as soya lecithin, is likely to have animal origin. Mono- and di-glycerides of fatty acids are not reliable, unless it goes with "suitable for vegetarian" symbol.

2. Check for commonly used haraam ingredients:
(i) alcohol / ethyl alcohol. For example, most croissant doughs contain alcohol. Most sauces contain white wine.
(ii) whey (alcohol used during processing of whey) - mostly used in breads, biscuits, cakes, cheese etc. I frankly cannot appreciate why so many foodstuff contain whey, since whey is rarely sold separately in the market.
(iii) cheese (unless specified that the rennet used is from non-animal source). For example, Sainsbury pizzas use vegetarian cheese.
(iv) any animal-based ingredient (lard, etc.)
(v) soy sauce (which is mostly brewed). So far I have only been able to find one philipino soy sauce (datuk) in UK which is labelled halal. Avoid chinese food even from halal restaurant, since they would most likely be using haraam soy sauce.
(vi) gelatin - mostly in ice creams, gum-based candies etc.

3. Avoid products which do not have full ingredient disclosure. Better safe than sorry! Milk products enriched with Omega3 do not carry "suitable for vegetarian" symbol, so that leaves me with doubt if omega3 is sourced from anything other than fish.

4. If in doubt, always check various websites listing the haraam and doubtful ingredients. Be open to throwing away the stuff that you bought, but later discovered them to be haraam.

5. This rule is strictly not halal driven, but politically motivated. If possible (i.e. when you have an alternative), avoid products made/produced in Israel (unfortunately, most medjool dates are produced here), Denmark (i.e. when community boycott calls for it) etc.

I am not a qualified food expert, but after few years of halal-conciousness and using the websites (listing halal products), I have formed the above rules for myself.