Wine Addition, To Meat

QUESTION: Someone added a tablespoon of cooking wine to a roast. Afterwards, he realized that the cooking wine was not kosher certified (stam yainam). Is the wine batel (nullified) in the roast?

ANSWER: Ordinarily, when there is a mixture of 60 parts kosher to one-part non-kosher, the non-kosher is batel (nullified) and the mixture may be consumed. This is known as batel bishishim (nullified in 60). The reason bitul occurs at this ratio of 1:60 is because at that point it is assumed that the taste of the non-kosher is no longer detectable, and it becomes halachically irrelevant. Wine is an exception, and it is batel bishesh (in six parts) of water, (and according to Taz, this applies to other drinks as well). This is because wine loses its chashivus (special importance) when diluted and is no longer treated as wine. The Shach (YD 134:21) cites the ruling of the Issur V’Heter (23:15) that non-kosher wine is only batel (nullified) bishesh when mixed with liquid. However, if non-kosher wine is cooked with solid food, bitul occurs only if there is a ratio of 60 to 1. When less than 60:1, the wine is still significant and is not batel because it imparts a positive taste to the solid food. 

Based on the Issur V’Heter, in our scenario, the wine will be batel in the roast only if there is a 60:1 ratio. It is often difficult to make that determination because the volume of a roast is not easily measured. One would think that if we don’t know if there is a 60:1 ratio, the roast will be permitted because stam yainom is a Rabbinic prohibition, and the rule of safek dirabonon likulah (an uncertainty about a Rabbinic prohibition is permitted) should apply. This, however, is not the case. If there is a safek (uncertainty) because of chisoron yediah (a lack of knowledge or an inability to calculate) safek dirabbonon likulah is inoperative. If we cannot calculate the volume of the roast, the wine is not batel and the roast cannot be consumed. However, if it is possible to calculate the volume of the roast but we did not realize there was a concern until the roast was cooked, and now it has shrunk in size, and do not know the initial volume when the wine was introduced, safek dirabonon applies. In this second case, the safek is not a result of intellectual deficiency, but rather, it is simply not possible to know how large the roast was before the cooking began, and therefore the roast can be consumed. 

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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.