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An image of a French press, with the piece at the bottom of the plunger, on top of the filtering disc circled.

On a French press, there is a piece that sits on the bottom of the plunger rod above the filtering discs called a shoulder nut. The purpose of this piece is to keep the filtering discs plunged down and in place so they don't tilt and allow the coffee grounds to pass between the discs and carafe when the coffee is poured into a cup.

My piece recently came loose and the company sent me a metal replacement that screws on (the original piece came attached to the plunger). Does this require tevila since it touches the food, or not since it isn't directly preparing the food?

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    NOTE: Like Wikipedia, this site makes no guarantee of validity, and does not offer professional (particularly rabbinic) advice. Treat information from this site like it came from a crowd of your friends.
    – msh210 ♦
    Jul 4, 2012 at 0:21
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    If someone could find a youtube video showing one of these in action that would be most useful.
    – Double AA ♦
    Jul 4, 2012 at 2:38
  • @DoubleAA is this good? youtube.com/watch?v=TcXzHQq8V7U
    – Hacham Gabriel
    Jul 4, 2012 at 3:29
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    @DoubleAA, I invite you over any time for a terrific cup of French press coffee. Although I've recently become quite fond of pour-over. But I digress. The point here is for you to learn how French presses work. And drink amazing coffee...
    – Seth J
    Jul 4, 2012 at 4:24
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    @avi, your point seems to be that this case certainly has some qualifications to be toveled, so even if the halacha isn't 100% clear, I should tovel it anyway. Certainly I am not too concerned about the extra trip to the mikva, I am more interested in clarifying the halacha.
    – YDK
    Jul 5, 2012 at 13:36

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Insofar as it sounds like the shoulder nut is not normally removable and is necessary for the proper functioning of the French press, I believe that not only does it not require tevilah (immersion in a mikvah) the fact that the Jewish owner must preform this assembly would negate the need for tevilah for the entire French press itself [presuming the repair was required before it had been immersed already]. The circumstances seem to imply that this repair is a halachiclly significant act of completing the utensil and as such is is "Jewish made" and requires no immersion. Of course it is clearly a case where a posek should be consulted to judge how significant the assembly is.

(Furthermore, even if the act wasn't significant enough to negate the need for immersion of the French press, it is probable that the shoulder nut alone does not have a status of a utensil until it has been added to the French press, which we have noted is done by a Jew in our case so no tevillah is required because they are the one who "made" it).

http://www.star-k.org/kashrus/kk-containers-tevilas.htm

A possible suggestion would be to disassemble the vessel and have a Jew reassemble the vessel. Reassembly would not apply to the parts of a meat grinder that are regularly assembled and disassembled during ordinary use. Reassembly would apply to utensils that are not ordinarily dismantled.

http://www.dinonline.org/2012/05/04/tevilas-keilim-for-electronic-appliances/

An alternative option is for a Jew to take apart the appliance and re-assemble it.

https://judaism.stackexchange.com/a/1136/899

Firstly, an appliance made by a Jew doesn't need to be dunked in a mikva. If you can "break" and then "fix" the appliance yourself, that works. (What's called "breaking" and "fixing"?)

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