The Meat Status of Leftover Condiments

Q. I put out several bowls of mustard at a fleishig sheva berachos. They appear to barely have been touched. Can I pour them back into the mustard jar, or if I do, will all the mustard in the jar be considered fleishig?

A. The Rema (YD 88:2) writes that the minhag is to have separate bowls of salt for milchigs and fleishigs. This is because crumbs of food might end up in the salt. Therefore, a bowl of salt that was served at a meat meal should not be used at a dairy meal. The same would be true for bowls of mustard. Since they were placed on the fleishig table, you should be concerned that crumbs of meat might have fallen into the mustard. Even though the mustard appears clean and, strictly speaking, you are not required to suspect that this happened, the custom is to be strict. If you pour the mustard back into the container, you should write on the container that the mustard is fleishig. However, if one accidentally served the mustard with dairy, the food would still be fine. 

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The Gerald & Karin Feldhamer OU Kosher Halacha Yomis is dedicated to the memory of Rav Yisroel Belsky, zt"l, who served as halachic consultant for OU Kosher for more than 28 years; many of the responses in Halacha Yomis are based on the rulings of Rabbi Belsky. Subscribe to the Halacha Yomis daily email here.