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By Rabbi Dovid Cohen, Administrative Rabbinic Coordinator

Q. Our town isn’t large enough to support a regular kosher restaurant.  Is it okay for me to eat at a non-kosher vegan restaurant, since they don’t have any meat, fish, or cheese?

A. As you note, a vegan restaurant will not serve meat, fish, or cheese, and, therefore, if you eat there, you’ll avoid several types of non-kosher food, but by no means will that result in the food actually being kosher.  This is because there are at least 3 ways that vegan food can be non-kosher.

Firstly, one of the staples at a vegan restaurant is salad and other greens, and most of those require checking and washing to ensure they are free of insects.  Although I suspect most vegans would not want to eat insects and probably also wash vegetables before using them, we know that small insects will remain, unless someone follows more rigorous procedures, such as those provided by hashgachos.  Thus, a person eating vegetables at a vegan restaurant is likely consuming insects.

Secondly, grape juice or wine which are not mevushal and are touched or moved by someone who is not Shomer Shabbos, are forbidden as stam yayin, but would be used at a vegan restaurant.

Lastly, any food which is not edible raw and is fit to serve to distinguished guests (oleh al shulchan melachim) is only kosher if a Jewish person participated in the cooking.  This prohibition, known as bishul akum, applies to many of the starches that might be served at vegan restaurants, such as rice, potatoes, pasta, and quinoa.

The above focused on vegan restaurants.  A vegetarian restaurant might serve cheese, which raises concerns of gevinas akum, the Rabbinic requirement that a Jew participate in the creation of hard cheese.  [Vegans do not eat cheese, or anything else which is derived from living beings.}

Presumably, a knowledgeable person could find dishes on the menu that would be free of all the concerns noted above.  However, that would raise the issue of “keilim”, which is to say that if my food was prepared with the same pots and knives as non-kosher food, the non-kosher ta’am (taste) absorbed into those dishes can potentially spread into my food.  Not only might this occur in the kitchen of the vegan restaurant, but it also might have happened at the factory where the ingredients were made.  For example, the vegetable oil might have been deodorized on the same equipment used for animal fat, or the vegan “cheese” is produced on machinery which is also used for standard milk-based cheese.  These are all things that a Mashgiach would look out for, and which would be missing if the vegan restaurant was not certified as kosher.  Accordingly, non-certified restaurants are not recommended for kosher consumers, even if those restaurants have menus that seem somewhat kosher-friendly.

This article first appeared in the Let’s Talk Kashrus column, Yated Ne’eman, July 26, 2024.