This Shabbat we ate a meal with a couple visiting from the US. Part of the conversation (as usual this year) was about shemittah, how difficult it is to observe, what to buy and what not to buy, etc. Then, as another example of something else that they might find interesting about buying food in Israel, I explained that here you do not walk into the butcher shop and ask for ribs, or London Broil or Flanken or any other cut of beef that you might want. Instead, you ask by the number. Imagine a chart of a cow, divided into sections, with each section getting a number. If you want meat from that section of the cow, you ask for the number.

No one believed me.

Really, that is the way it works here (Adina confirmed for me, and said how there is a chart of a cow with numbers in the local supermarket). Not only that – this morning I logged on, and the first link I clicked on happened to bring me to Meat Cuts Explained – this post explains what each number is for. בתיאבון!