Do filter bags need to have a Hechsher since they are going into soups?

 

The filter bags don’t need to be kosher but you must be sure that no bugs can leave the bag.

As for the idea of using such bags to prevent the need for checking: With foods that are certainly infested, one should not do this, but we need not admonish those who do, provided the garment is thick.

Where the food is not definitely infested, it may be done but one should check and clean first superficially.

 

Explanation in brief:

The bugs that are in the unchecked herbs would give off a bad taste to the soup and would be inconsequential (any non-kosher food that gives a bad taste to a kosher food is called Pagum and doesn’t make the kosher food non-kosher).

Even though one may not intentionally nullify something that is forbidden, here your intention is not to nullify the bugs but rather to add the taste of herbs to the soup.

Even if there is a remote concern that the bugs might have left the bag, we may assume that the bugs stayed in the bag, and even if they left the bag there is an assumption that the bugs became crushed during the cooking process and therefore could be nullified in the soup.

 

Sources:

לעיין היטב פת״ש פד סק”ג בסופו. פמ״ג בשפ״ד פד סקל״ג. שם או״ח תנג בא״א סק״ג בסופו. וראה ערוך השולחן פד, סג. זבחי צדק ח״א פד אות סג.

ולכן כתבנו שבודאי מתולע אין לעשות ואין לגעור. ובספק מותר ויברור מאי דאפשר.

 

 

#9520