W. Hartford Jewish Community Hopes Big Y Won’t Discontinue Kosher Offerings

For years, the Waldbaum’s supermarket in West Hartford has supplied the Jewish community with fresh kosher meats, deli products and baked goods.

Now, some community members, particularly Orthodox Jews, worry that Big Y, the Springfield, Mass.-based grocery retailer which purchased Waldbaum’s, will eliminate the store’s kosher departments. The uncertainty has sparked not only concerns about limited choices, but also has resurrected a thornier issue of whether the kosher supermarket across Albany Avenue is kosher enough.

Waldbaum’s, owned by the parent company of A&P, will close at the end of the month and is expected to reopen as a Big Y World Class Market, but the fate of the store’s kosher departments hasn’t been announced. Big Y only will say that it’s in the “process of evaluating the entire kosher lineup,” said its spokeswoman, Claire D’Amour-Daley.

Orthodox seniors — many of whom live close enough to drive motorized carts and wheelchairs to the store — in particular would be hard hit if Big Y discontinued the store’s kosher departments.

“Waldbaum’s had been a very loyal grocery for consumers committed to keeping kosher … any effort to limit those services is to do an injustice to that commitment,” said Rabbi Yitzchok Adler, head of Beth David Synagogue in West Hartford, an Orthodox congregation.

Food products that are labeled kosher must be prepared in accordance with Jewish dietary laws, and their production supervised by a rabbi or rabbinic group. But the three largest Jewish denominations in the United States — Orthodox, Conservative and Reform — don’t always recognize each other’s authority or kosher certification.

The Crown Market, which bills itself as kosher, says it serves the Orthodox community and is stepping up its offerings of the strictest kosher-certified foods. But when it comes to food and religion, some customers are a tough sell.

“The kosher supervision at Crown is not considered to be reliable by the Orthodox community,” said Albert Engel, an Orthodox Jew whose West Hartford family shops at Waldbaum’s. “When Waldbaum’s closes, they will have to go to Waterbury for kosher meats.”

The kosher foods at Waldbaum’s are certified by Orthodox rabbis with the Hartford Kashrut Commission, headed by Adler.

On the other hand, Crown Market’s kosher meat and deli departments are certified by Conservative rabbis with the Greater Hartford Kashrut Group. (Kashrut simply refers to Jewish dietary laws.)

“On more than one occasion, the Rabbinic Association of Hartford voted to endorse the Hartford Kashrut Commission as the community authority for kosher supervision in the Greater Hartford community,” Adler said. “The Crown Market is not endorsed by the Hartford Kashrut. The Crown has private certification. It is not Orthodox. It is private. Do you want a doctor who is self-certified or one who is certified by other doctors?”

The difference in certification has been a sensitive topic in West Hartford for “better than 15 years” said Marc Bokoff, who purchased The Crown Market in May 2009.

“It’s a misstatement to say the Orthodox community can’t shop here,” Bokoff said. “There are Orthodox people who do shop here. We carry hundreds of products that are designated OU, the Orthodox Union,” Bokoff said.

Bokoff said The Crown is taking steps to help the Orthodox community fill any possible void.

“Starting next week, we’re going to start carrying meat and chicken that is acceptable to the Orthodox people in the community. We are bringing in some prepackaged Glatt kosher fresh meat and chicken … these products are acceptable to anybody,” Bokoff said.

Others are concerned that if Big Y closes the kosher departments, it simply will limit everyone’s options.

“For me, it’s more convenient to shop here,” said Sanford Cohn as he wheeled a shopping cart through the aisles of Waldbaum’s last week to pick up items for the traditional breaking of the fast at the Yom Kippur holiday Saturday night.

“For the sake of the rest of the community, it’s better to have Orthodox certification as well,” said Cohn, cantor at The Emanuel Synagogue in West Hartford, a Conservative congregation.

“It’s nice to have a choice,” said Mindy Cohen, an Orthodox Jew, who was working behind the counter at the Judaica Store at Crossroads Plaza in West Hartford. Cohen’s husband is Rabbi Edward Cohen, head of United Synagogues of Greater Hartford, an Orthodox/traditional congregation.

“We love The Crown, but we need another store with glatt kosher,” said Rivka Weiselfish, owner of the Judaica Store, referring to the highest certification level.

“Many people are on edge,” said Rabbi Yosef Wolvovsky, who was shopping last Thursday at the Judaica Store in West Hartford.

But Wolvovsky said he and others will take steps to ensure the Jewish community does not go without:

“We’re going to make some kind of accommodations, whether that means setting up a co-op or getting a distributor to bring in food,” said Wolvovsky, executive director of Chabad Jewish Center in Glastonbury.

Although Big Y has operated kosher meat and deli departments in the past, they closed for lack of demand, D’Amour-Daley said. “We had them in the Big Y in Avon,” she said. “They did not do well at all and we ended up discarding the process.”

As for whether Big Y will keep the former Waldbaum’s kosher departments, a company spokeswoman said it hopes to have more information in a week or two.

On the plus side, D’Amour-Daley said once Waldbaum’s closes, its conversion to a Big Y should only take a short time. “When we have acquired other stores in the past, we tried to convert them in less than a week.”

Jewish and non-Jewish shoppers, who value the “kosher label and credible rabbinic supervision,” said Adler, will be negatively impacted if Big Y does not maintain the store’s kosher departments.

Many non-Jews who are allergic to milk or dairy by-products, for example, depend on the kosher label to stay healthy. Other non-Jews say kosher food just tastes better.

Adeline Parker, for one, said she would miss the kosher meats. “I’m Italian and a Congregationalist,” said Parker, a resident of Federation Square Apartments who shops at Waldbaum’s nearly every day.

“The kosher cuts are better. They’re a little finer. And I like the kosher pastries they have,” said Parker. “I like good things and the Jews have the best!”