For donations Click Here

Kashering a Hotplate

Someone’s child came over to the hotplate on Shabbos and put on it a piece of hard cheese. When it was finally noticed the cheese had already melted on the hotplate. Does one need to kasher the hotplate? How?

Answer:

It is preferable to kasher the hotplate.

If the place of contact with the cheese was clean, and there was no residue of meat — and assuming that it has been so for 24 hours before the cheese was placed on the surface — it follows that me’ikar ha-din it is sufficient to clean the hotplate so that there is no cheese left.

Yet, it is preferable to kasher the hotplate by turning it on its maximum heat, and then pouring boiling water on the hotplate from a keli rishon (from a kettle).

Note that if there were meaty pots on the hotplate while the cheese was on it, and the surface of the hotplate where the pots were was wet, the pot will also require kashering.

Sources:

According to most authorities, a utensil does not absorb taste from another utensil when both are dry, and therefore if the hotplate was dry the taste of the cheese will not be imparted to pots on the hotplate (see Shach 105:22, 24; Aruch Hashulchan 42; Mishnah Berurah 451:34; Iggros Moshe 1:4 and 3:10 rules that one need not be stringent even on a lechatchilah level, not like the Peri Megadim 105 and 97:3 and Orach Chaim 451 who writes that lechatchilah one should be stringent).

See, however, the Kaf Ha-Chaim (end of 92) who writes that one should be stringent lechatchilah for fear that one will place foods directly onto the source of heat, but it is possible that this will not apply to a hotplate, where we usually don’t directly place foods.

In our case, if there was no meat on the hotplate (and for 24 hours before) many poskim maintain that the case is bala heiter (see Chasam Sofer Yoreh De’ah 110 and Shut Rema Mi-Fano 96; see also Rema 93:1 and Shach 3), and therefore there is no need for libun chamur, and it is enought to perform hag’alah. This is true the more so in our case, where the kashering is only a matter of lechatchilah. Furthermore, some write that for beliyos by fire one only needs the equivalent degree of heat to that which created the original beliyah.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *