OU Kosher presented a webcast, “Kashrut in the Workplace,” featuring OU Senior Halachic Consultants Rabbi Yisroel Belsky and Rabbi Hershel Schachter. The event was moderated by Rabbi Eliyahu Safran, Senior Rabbinic Coordinator and Vice President of Communications and Marketing at OU Kosher. The webcast can be seen by visiting https://www.ou.org/torah/kashrut/ask-ou/kashrut-in-the-workplace/.
Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, Executive Vice president of the OU, was an honored guest at the event.
The webcast was part of OU Kosher’s continuing and ever-growing educational outreach to the community, which includes the “OU Kosher Coming to Schools and Communities” program, and the highly informative and entertaining Kosher Tidbits postings focusing on all aspects of kashrut, now numbering 125 on OU Radio.
Rabbi Safran asked questions which had been sent in before and during the program, with the responses transcribed by Rabbi Eliyahu Ferrell, Rabbinic Coordinator. Rabbis Belsky and Schachter answered questions on common workplace issues such as heating kosher food in microwaves not exclusively used for kosher food in the office; participating at business meetings held at non-kosher restaurants and attending non-kosher office holiday parties; using the office coffee machine; issues of maarat ayin (appearance of doing something wrong), such as eating a kosher lunch among non-Jews who are eating non-kosher food at public cafeterias; and many other concerns.
People with questions that were not addressed can send them to Rabbi Safran at 212-613-0775.