Australian Kosher Authorities

We are still learning a lot about how to buy kosher in Australia; where to shop, what to avoid, whether generic brands have the same status as the branded foods (unfortunately not, in most cases). Discovering what is actually kosher has been the biggest challenge for us, since we couldn’t survive on the stash of MREs, oatmeal, and tuna that we brought from overseas forever.

There are four Kosher authorities in Australia- Kosher Australia (based in Melbourne), the Adass Israel Kosher Supervision Authority (also based in Melbourne), the Kashrut Authority of Australia, New Zealand, and the South Pacific (based in Sydney), and Kosher V’Yosher/Holy Kosher/It’s Kosher, a fourth nationwide authority that we do hold by. *

What has been very useful has been the access to information about what is kosher: the Kashrut Authority of Australia, NZ, and the South Pacific (KA-ANZ)’s website is open and free. You can easily search for what you need and it will return a list of acceptable brands. The website was revamped in early 2019, not to everyone’s liking (admittedly, the old one was easier to read), but is the best free resource on keeping Kosher in Australia.

Both the KA-ANZ and Kosher Australia (KA) also have a Facebook page where you can ask questions about products that are currently certified, express interest in products you want certified, and hear about newly certified products. See Ask Kosher Australia and the Kashrut Authority of ANZ.

For the real gold star approval, the KA-ANZ also uses its Facebook page prior to Pesach specifically to hold Q&A with Rabbi Moshe Gutnick (their chief authority) about any questions users may have. Pesach is a particularly challenging time, and this is an incredibly helpful way of allowing those who are far away from a mainstream community to get insight on how best to deal with the holiday. In Sydney and Melbourne, there are lectures presented in the lead up to Pesach to answer the same types of questions, but these are accessible to those who live in those cities alone.

The KA-ANZ also used to be linked directly to the Is It KA Approved? website. This was a website run by an independent body who (likely, but not confirmed) scraped KA-ANZ’s data and provided it in a more useful online web search format. The website is similarly set out to Google’s search site, and modeled on the UK website Is It Kosher? UK, which has a comprehensive listing of all foods certified by the London Beth Din and wider EU authorities. Note that the latter is only relevant to food purchased in the UK.**

There are also some excellent mobile app’s available if you are technologically savvy. KA has its own app, which costs around $50 per year for a subscription. It is updated very frequently- almost weekly. However, they provide the app for free to parents of children at Liebler Yavneh College (Melbourne) and newlyweds are also eligible for a year’s free membership. That is what we have done (yes, we sent a copy of our Ketubah, the Jewish marriage certificate from our wedding), and so far, it has been very handy. The KA do not have an online kosher list so this is the only source of information about what they certify, and it is more comprehensive than referring to the KA-ANZ’s website alone.

The other app we have used a ton since we moved here is Is It Kosher?, a worldwide kosher list collecting app that you can personalise based on what country you are in. This is great for travelers, as you can download lists and keep them on your phone.

We have found that sometimes there are discrepancies between the KA app, the KA-ANZ list, and the Is It Kosher? app. That has not been the case with the KAList website. The Facebook groups have been a useful way to quickly rectify a disputed item’s kosher status, though, so I would highly recommend a look. Even if that is the only thing you use Facebook for!

* The reasons we don’t hold by this authority is not relevant to this post and plenty of Australian Jews are happy to use this certification agency. The objective of this post is not to advise which authority to use or not, rather to explain what is out there.

** I was extremely sad to discover that the Is It KA Approved? website was shut down due to copyright concerns. This website was one of the most useful references we had when moving given that we knew very little about the Australian kashrut landscape. As a strong proponent of Open-Source Judaism/Digital Judaism, I am doubly sad about this. I hope that the website is instituted again soon.

Home!

Well, it finally happened! We found a place to live! This is wonderful, because we are sick and tired of moving around every few days, which is what we’ve been doing since we got here.

We were quite unlucky to arrive a week before Parliament sits. For those who don’t know, Canberra is the capital of Australia, home of the glorious Parliament House (with grass and a rooftop garden that tourists can walk over “so that the Members of Parliament know under whom they serve”, according to locals). Politicians meet here once-a-month (I think?) to turn into verbal attack dogs and mull over legislation for a couple of days, and during parliamentary sitting times, all the accommodation in Canberra is occupied by politicians.

We didn’t get the memo, so were moved about from place to place quite erratically- a week down South, a week up North, another week in the main drag – except that it was never quite a week, and we never quite managed to get ahead and recover from the exhausting travel before packing up our bags again and heading to a new place.

Anyway, that is all over folks, because we have scored a place! A casa! A home sweet home! We are thankful for a number of fortuitous events that led us to this point, including our first trip to the local Shul, one unsuccessful rental application, two additional successful rental applications, and one very kind friend of mine who sent me a text saying “Hey, this looks like a place in the area you wanted that isn’t too expensive”. We jumped on it straight away and were luckily the first people who came to inspect the place. We met the owner, and long story short, all parties were quite happy to enter into contractual obligations with each other.

What a feeling! It hasn’t happened yet (it will tomorrow), and to be honest, it hasn’t really been that long since we arrived, but I cannot wait to have a permanent place to store my things and rest my head. Oh, joy!

Settling in

Moving to a new suburb or city is tough; moving to a new country and unknown city is even tougher. Luckily, I already know a lot of people here, so I am not too worried about making friends. I anticipate that the biggest challenge of moving will be integrating my lifestyle choices- to be kosher and eat healthy – into my new life in Canberra. When I last lived in Australia, I wasn’t keeping kosher or observant, and I’m still not sure how my best friends will react. They all know that I’ve become more observant, but I’ve been living 14,000+ km’s away for five years and the practical implications for my social life haven’t been particularly relevant to them. Until now..

I’m quite apprehensive about it, and have yet to explain fully what these lifestyle choices mean in the context of my relationships. Most of my friends here are not Jewish, so there are actually quite a few things to be aware of, but so far I haven’t had to explain much –  in other words, no one has asked us to dinner yet!

Unfortunately, before I can even worry about that, we need to figure out what we actually can eat. In our own (temporary) kitchen. Yes, we don’t have anywhere to live, and that’s obviously a pressing concern, but more importantly, we aren’t familiar with which supermarket items are kosher or not, so we don’t even know what we can buy. And yes, I used to live here, and was involved with the Jewish world, but knowing what was kosher ten years ago is not exactly helpful- some of those brands don’t even exist anymore!

So what to do?

Well, any fruits and vegetables are fine to eat, and we still have some muesli bars and tinned fish we brought with us, so we we have started by eating that.

We don’t have kosher plates and cutlery where we are (ah, the glory of international moves!), so we have bought a temporary set of plastic plates and cutlery to use until we figure out how to tovel. We also bought a knife for my friend Tristan which we have kept until we return to him- that’s a workaround for not being able to get to an appropriate place where we can tovel our dishes yet! Yes, buy your non-Jewish friends an item and borrow it from them temporarily. (Note: we were later told that this works for a one-time use of a metal or glass object only, we will be investigating this further.)

We also bought some plastic tupperware so that I can make salads at work, an excellent idea for summer, and for when we don’t have any food options!

How are we making this a sustainable choice? We are both very concerned with the environment in addition to being kosher and wanting to eat healthy. It’s the last piece of the puzzle, and what makes our trifecta of necessary eating conditions.

Unfortunately, using plastic cutlery and plates isn’t great for the environment. In fact, we would much prefer more permanent eating tools. Part of the problem is a lack of access to a mikvat kelim, or a place to immerse our dishes. The other thing is that we actually already own lots of dishes- they’re just stuck on a boat (currently in the Suez Canal*) on their way to us, and we don’t want to spend a lot of money buying more. Then there’s also the fact that we are moving around from AirBnb to AirBnb every few days and we don’t want to carry lots of heavy plates with us..

Our plan with the plastics is to reuse and keep reusing! We have been washing up our plastics every time and haven’t thrown anything away yet. In addition, we’ve tried to minimise our plastic packaging, buying our fruit and vegetables as is, where possible.

Our next priority is figuring out what else is kosher since we are running out of the food we brought from overseas and toveling our dishes! But until then, instant oatmeal and tuna salad for every meal!

 

* We later discovered that we’d been tracking the journey of the wrong boat, which made sense, because the Suez anal is not on the way to Australia from North(East) America and the boat carrying our furniture was (thankfully) not very adventurous..

Welcome to Canberra!

Well, Count H and I just moved to Canberra last week. What a treat! We were so excited for the hot Australian summer, flies and all. Unfortunately, we got a Canberran weather disaster: a dust storm came to meet us, it was unusually cold (with snow!), and so I promptly caught a terrible cold.. Thankfully today (finally!) has been sunshine galore. For a minute there, I thought I hadn’t left the Northern Hemisphere at all..

Anyway, let’s get to business- we moved to Canberra! Wow, what a change from living in places where kosher food abounds. We have come from North America, and right before we came here, we were in Israel (yes, we have a block of cheese with us which we bought in Israel.. Originally from the Netherlands- yes, real Edam! And yes, it’s for shabbat). Moving to a new country without many kosher options [Australia] is a challenge to begin with, but it is even more so when moving to a quaint country town – and though Canberra is the capital, let’s be real, folks – it’s very much the country!

Now, about our habits.. Count H eats food but isn’t as partial about it as I am. He has always kept kosher. I have not kept strictly kosher in Australia since I was in high school, but I do keep strictly kosher now. My palette has also expanded hugely since then – with credit to influential people offering me new foods and a lot of international travel. I love all things food and I love experimenting in the kitchen.

Now how can this possibly end well? I mean, what is being kosher in Australia even like? Will I be able to find any of the ingredients I need to whip up some laksa, agedashi, or osso buco? Will I be able to make the food kosher and ketogenic-diet (or any other diet) friendly? What happen when a foodie decides to move to a place where she (or he) can’t find ingredients easily – does the even foodie survive? Welcome to my blog. Let’s find out!