Pizza

Pizza (Italian: [ˈpittsa], Neapolitan: [ˈpittsə]) is a savory dish of Italian origin, consisting of a usually round, flattened base of leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomatoes, cheese, and various other ingredients (anchovies, olives, meat, etc.) baked at a high temperature, traditionally in a wood-fired oven. In formal settings, like a restaurant, pizza is eaten with knife and fork, but in casual settings it is cut into wedges to be eaten while held in the hand. Small pizzas are sometimes called pizzettas.

89471

Food . Pizza

Is it necessary to question a non-Muslim making your food whether, for example, what they are using to cut the pizza was used to cut food which is forbidden?

Zaid Alsalami, Shaykh Dr Zaid Alsalami is an Iraqi born scholar, raised in Australia. He obtained a BA from Al-Mustafa University, Qom, and an MA from the Islamic College in London. He also obtained a PhD from... Answered 1 year ago

Bismihi ta'ala

If you have a strong level of assurance that the source of food is halāl, and ingredients used are also halāl, another important factor is the tahārah of the food you eat/drink.

You must make sure there is no cross-contamination with anything najis, whether that be other non-halāl products, or that the person preparing the food is not tāhir.

In the case of when you go to a pizza shop, which might not be exclusively halāl, then there is the problem of cross-contamination. When the toppings are being added in the previous non-halāl order, the person preparing the pizza used tongs or his/her hands for the remaining toppings.

The same is for the knife or roller that cuts the pizza, and it having been used on a non-halāl pizza.

So, the option in this case would be to ask for gloves to be changed, a clean pan to be used, knives to be washed, and toppings to be new.

However, if you have assurance that this isn't the case, and there is no cross-contamination or anything else, then you can consider it tāhir and halāl.

One might argue that such prying into details of food ingredients and matters of halāl and tāhir is too much and is making our lives difficult.

I would say you deal with affairs of your religion and what you eat/drink based on the level of piety and caution you have towards your religion.

And Allah knows best.

51328

Restaurant . Meat . Vegetarian . Pizza . Oven . Cooking Oil . French Fries

Is eating vegetarian pizza permitted from a restaurant in the US keeping in view that the same oven was used for meat pizza's? And what about french fries given that the oil used may have been used with meat products?

Bismihi ta'ala

In these mentioned cases, cross-contamination with najasah would make the food najis as well, and therefore haram to eat.

Unless you know that the common process in these restaurants is that they wash the pizza pan, change gloves, wash the knife, and so on. You can ask them these questions, and you can ask that the pizza not be cut, to avoid contamination from najasah.

As for using the same oven, that would not be a problem, because the pizza is put on a pan and then in the oven. If a pan is not used, then this is when there would be a problem.

In regards to french fries, or "chips", not only must the oil itself be halal, it must not have been used for cooking anything non-halal that is najis.

The oil must not be animal based, so it should be vegetable oil. What is cooked in it must not be najis, like meat that has not been Islamically slaughtered. However, if it is not halal to eat, but tahir, then there would not be a problem, like non-halal sea food. This is something you will experience in a fish and chips shop, where they might cook fish that does not have scales, or maybe even crab, in the same oil as the chips, or halal fish. In this case there is no problem, as long as there are no pieces of that food sticking to the food that you are going to eat.

And Allah knows best.