Probably a better thread for the Scripture forum.
The food was unclean according to the Jewish Levitical Law. The meat and wine may have been offered to idols and prepared improperly according to the dietary laws. There was really no way to know exactly what meat it was, from clean or unclean animals.
One example of what was going in is how King Nebuchadnezzar has siezed the holy vessels from the temple, and how Nebuchadnezzar’s son later used the sacred vessels for profane purposes.
King Belshazzar gave a great banquet for a thousand of his nobles, with whom he drank. Under the influence of the wine, he ordered the gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar, his father, had taken from the temple in Jerusalem, to be brought in so that the king, his nobles, his consorts, and his concubines might drink from them. (Daniel 5:1-2)
This is an example of why Daniel and his comrades were hesitant about consuming anything other than vegetables and water. They were usure where the food came from, if it was used in pagan rituals, who had prepared it, etc. Some of the pagans even ate human flesh, and so anything was possible. They were simply trying to be faithful to the Law of Moses and thereby be faithful to God.
-Tim-
