Faqs

Q. Someone mixed non-kosher brandy into dough. Is it batel b'shishah or b'shishim?

A. Brandy is a distilled product made from pure wine, and typically it would not have any other ingredients of significance. [Distillation is a process which uses heat to concentrate alcoholic beverages via separating the (desirable) alcohol from the (less-desirable) water.]

The primary reason why a brandy would be not kosher is because it is stam yayin (wine touched by a non-Jew), and the bitul/nullification of stam yayin has a unique halacha. If stam yayin was mixed into a beverage (other than wine) it is batel b'shishah (batel if diluted in 6 times its volume), and if was mixed into a solid food, then it requires the standard bitul b'shishim. [For more on this, see Shulchan Aruch YD 134:2 & 5, Taz 114:4, Nekudos HaKesef ad loc., and Iggeros Moshe YD 1:62.]

Accordingly, in this situation, the dough is only permitted if it contained 60 times the volume of the brandy.