“Vegan Restaurants Aren’t Kosher”

By COLlive reporter

Rabbi Kalman Weinfeld, Rabbinic Coordinator of the Food Service Department at OK Kosher Certification, has called the assumption that vegan restaurants are kosher by default “very wrong.”

Speaking to COLlive.com on Wednesday, Rabbi Weinfeld stated that every food establishment requires a reliable kosher supervising agency in order to be deemed a suitable place for kosher consumers.

“There’s no such a thing as a Kosher restaurant without a hechsher,” he said. “A restaurant can be non-kosher even if they are only serving vegan, plant-based food without dairy or meat.”

He recalled a vegan restaurant chain contacting the OK for certification. “We told them the requirements are that every location has to employ a Shomer Shabbos Mashgiach, from open until closing,” he said. “They said it was too expensive and they didn’t end up using us.

“A few months later, a person working in the company told me, ‘You were so right about the necessity of a Mashgiach Temidi.’ They discovered an employee who’s been bringing back a non-Kosher burger during his lunch break and warming it up in the store’s deep fryer.”

Rabbi Weinfeld points out that not having a reliable Jew to oversee a vegan restaurant’s daily operation can lead to other major problems in basic kosher standards.

For example, he cites the possibility of a restaurant being open on Shabbos. “If the owner is a gentile, then who is the Mashgiach? If the owner is Jewish, he cannot be relied upon,” he says.

He went on to explain that without full-time supervision, there’s the concern of Bishul Akum (forbidden cooking by a gentile). “A non-Jew can be cooking a meal with 100% kosher ingredients, but if he turned on the fire, the food isn’t kosher. Not only that, the utensils are now not kosher.”

There’s also the need to have the vegetables checked for bugs, which are even more forbidden by the Torah than eating pork, he says.

“People think, ‘the restaurant is vegan, we don’t have to worry.’ But halachically, if someone eats a bug the size of a tiny dot, you are transgressing 4, 5, or even 6 prohibitions, depending on the type of bug. This is another example why you must have a Mashgiach.”

Rabbi Weinfeld won’t name any vegan restaurant by name. He did make clear that these areas of concern (Bishel Akum, bugs, open on Shabbos and relying on a non-Jew) should be the standards of kosher consumers.

One example, which he didn’t mention, is the popular vegan eatery “by Chloe” which has locations across New York City, Los Angeles and Boston. Its Williamsburg branch on N 3rd Street is said to be frequented by kosher consumers.

The chain’s website claims they are under the supervision of International Kosher Council (IKC) despite being open on Shabbos. IKC labels itself “an Orthodox certification” and is headed by Rabbi Zev Schwarcz, a graduate and musmach of Telshe Yeshiva in Cleveland.

The IKC website, however, does not list “by Chloe” on their list of certified restaurants on their website.

On its website, the IKC assures food establishments that “we are unintrusive and considerate of you and your employees.” One of their policies is that if a store owner is Jewish and the business is open on Shabbos, “there are some options available.”

Rabbi Weinfeld would not comment about IKC or by Chloe. A request from COLlive.com for a comment went unanswered by the IKC.

Neither the Chicago Rabbinical Council (CRC) nor Rabbi Eliezer Eidlitz of the Kosher Information Bureau list IKC or Rabbi Schwarcz as a recommended certification for the public to reply upon.