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Kosher in the Kingdom: What It’s Like for an American Keeping a Kosher Kitchen in the UK
When things started getting serious with my now-husband, Daniel, it was clear that I’d need to prepare to make some major life changes. For starters, I’d be relocating from NYC, where I’d spent the past 18 years, to Daniel’s hometown of London, UK (specifically, Northwest London, where seemingly 99% of the country’s Jewish population resides).
I’d also need to seriously up my Jewish observance. Daniel was a committed Modern Orthodox Jew, and I was… not.
When we were dating, we had lots of conversations about what our life together would look like Jewishly. We discussed the things we were willing to compromise on, and the things that were non-negotiables.
For Daniel, one of these was having a kosher kitchen.
I figured it wouldn’t be too hard. After all, I’d effectively been a kosher-style pescatarian for years, and Daniel, not being much of a meat eater (a rarity in the Orthodox world), was happy to agree to an all-dairy kitchen (even rarer). And when I browsed the aisles of my local Trader Joe’s – one of my favorite pastimes – I realized about 70% of the processed items that appealed to me had kosher certification.
“Okay,” I thought to myself. “I got this.”
To misquote the first episode of Jane the Virgin, she did not, in fact, got this.
Because what I didn’t realize is that the experience of keeping kosher in the UK bears very little resemblance to keeping kosher in the US.
Dude, Where’s My Cheez-It?
Turns out even your run-of-the-mill American grocery store is a veritable kosher wonderland compared to even the best of what the UK has to offer. While over 40% of packaged food for sale in the US is kosher, in the UK the number is much, much lower (I couldn’t find any solid data, but I doubt it’s even half that). Gone are the days when I could walk into any random supermarket and waltz out with a fun seasonal ice cream flavor, a pack of decent tortillas, and, just maybe, in a Jewish area, a passable baguette.
It’s not like the UK shops aren’t stocked with tons of tasty treats – it’s just that very, very few of them are kosher. As I found myself drooling over off-limits cheeses, lamenting the seasonal novelty snacks I was missing out on, and gazing longingly at all the lovely non-kosher biscuits, grocery shopping went from being one of my greatest pleasures to, frankly, kind of a downer.
I’ve had some especially sad moments when I spot a product I know is kosher in the US, only to find its British counterpart is sadly uncertified (looking at you, Pringles, Oreo, and Grey Poupon).
And Where Are My Hechshers?
Plus, the UK kashrut system is not easy to navigate. While in the US, any kosher packaged food is stamped clearly with a hechsher from one of a number of certifying agencies – making it easy to figure out what’s kosher and what’s not as you browse – things are much different here in England.
Here, very, very few products come with a kosher label on the package. Instead, you have to look every item up, one at a time, on an app (sorry, I mean a website that you must pull up on your browser – a few months after my move to London, one of the two main kashrut agencies shut down their app and, nearly two years later, has yet to replace it). God forbid you end up in a basement with no signal!
For the first few months, I didn’t even trust myself to grocery shop solo without a chaperone fluent in the ways of UK kosher (namely, Daniel). There may have been some tears involved.
But I Still Love Living in the UK
Now, two years into my life in the UK, I’ve made my peace with the situation – mostly. We have kosher Häagen-Dazs. I’m lucky to live within walking distance of three kosher shops, where I can shop (a smaller and costlier selection of products) stress-free. I’ve even found a handful of exciting kosher items in mainstream shops that are unlike anything I’ve ever found kosher in the States (check out Cofresh Indian snack mixes!). I enjoy checking out local ethnic groceries and finding random items with kosher certification – or foods the local kashrut authorities have decreed to be acceptable without one.
I still have my moments of frustration when grocery shopping, and I still reserve an extra suitcase for bringing back Trader Joe’s goodies on my way back from a trip to the US. But on the whole, my life here is really good, in ways that far outweigh the treats I’m missing out on.
If you know where to find kosher corn tortillas, cheesy snack crackers, or a good toaster waffle, though, hit me up.