Towards Better Kashrut Awareness

Celery

When we are in the supermarket doing our Shabbos shopping, many of us will find ourselves automatically grabbing the bagged “bug free” celery and throwing it into our shopping cart. Often we receive inquiries from people how can’t find the “bug free” celery or from people who just don’t want to spend the extra money. The callers want to know: can they use regular celery or not?
The answer is most definitely yes. While sometimes celery can be infested by thrips or regular food flies, they are nonetheless extremely easy to clean and check.
We will differentiate between the celery stalks and the leaves as they require different procedures.
Stalks:
1) cut the stalks from the heart of the celery (if whole celery was bought).
2) Cut off the leafy part of the celery.
3) Place the stalk under a strong stream of water and rub both sides of the stalk with fingers or a some sort of brush.
4) Enjoy, or add to your soup and then enjoy…
Note: if you notice a worm in the celery (and worms will be easily spotted as the celery stalk will have a whole in it and often the worm path will develop black dots) then the worm has to be removed. This can be done simply by splitting open the stalk and removing the worm. Afterwards the area should be thoroughly washed.
Leaves:
The leaves must be placed in water with a little bit of vegetable cleaning solution or a little bit of food grade soap (just a few drops). They should soak for three minutes and then should be rinsed under a strong stream of water. After being washed they should be inspected to insure they are bug free. Enjoy!

• Other Towards Better Kashrut Awareness
• Challah & Orla
• Let Us Eat Lettuce
• TU BiShvat Special