Shopping in Israel – An unique experience

Hebrew: עושים קניות בארץ – חוויה מיוחדת

Orderly lines, patient and polite cashiers, relaxed shoppers and obliging store managers! Are we in Israel?

You’ve made your shopping list, cleared your schedule and set out to your local supermarket. You maneuver your way around the narrow aisles with a heavy shopping cart. You’ve been pushed around a bit (and done a bit of pushing yourself) and now finally you reach the the check-out.  It all sounds perfectly simple and predictable but there are some things you need to know beforehand.

Supermarket trolley-carts

You have two trolley-cart options; a large metal trolley-cart that can hold a month’s supply of goods or a small, plastic, portable cart that can hold fewer items. 

Usually, you are required to insert a 5 shekel coin to release the large trolley-cart.  Make sure you have a 5 shekel coin on hand. If you don’t it becomes a real hassle getting one. Some supermarkets make use of a digital system; at the trolley shed you enter your teudat zehut number and the cart is then released.  When you return the cart, you enter your teudat zehut number again, a lock is released and you can return the cart to its original place.

Product Labeling

Most, but not all items have English labeling these days.  If the product is manufactured in Israel, the English labeling is likely to be very basic.  Bad label translations, from Hebrew to English, are quite funny and make for delightful shopping moments.

• Nutrition labeling of food items – red and green stickers

Grocery bags

We now have to pay for grocery bags and if you are not willing to do so, you must bring your own.  Most supermarkets sell tote bags for your grocery items which usually costs 3-5 NIS each.  When choosing a tote, make sure the shoulder straps are long enough that there is still a comfortable space under your arm so that the straps do not pull you down.  Personally, I like fabric totes and not the bulky plastic ones.  Although small, the Ikea tote is comfortable and folds up into itself – it’s cheap too.

At the check-out

Most supermarket chains have a self-checkout section or digital options where you can pay with the store app.  This is really convenient if you have a few items or are in a hurry.  If you get frustrated by the shopper ahead of you interacting with the cashier and describing the deal she got at the manicurist last week, unperturbed by the line of agitated shoppers, then the self-checkout is for you.

A typical neighborhood supermarket will have 6 or 10 cashiers and if you are lucky only 3 or 4 will be working at any given time.  Usually one checkout is an express till.  Recently I’ve noticed that if you can present a disabled certificate (issued by Bituach Leumi), you are exempt from standing in line.

Hyper stores have more cashiers.

Standing in line

What about orderly lines? Mostly we are used to 3 or 4 well mannered people standing, one behind the other, waiting their turn.  An orderly line in Israel is couple of well mannered people patiently waiting their turn while half-a-dozen others are trying to jump the queue. 

A shopper may come up to you with one or two items and with sad, tearful eyes she’ll tell you that she’s in a hurry.  She may tell you that she is late in fetching her child from school or has to get back to the office. She may not even have an excuse – she just has 2 items whereas you have 106 and she wants to go first.  The reason she cannot use the express line is not clear.

Whatever you decide, have your response ready and practiced.  If you are adamant and don’t want to lose your place or enter into a discussion, turn your head away, pretend the person does not exist and swear in a foreign language!

The express checkout counter

When we use the word ‘express’ what does that actually mean?  We expect that an 8 item express check-out means exactly that – 8 items: a bottle of milk, a loaf of bread, a packet of cheese, a bottle of fruit juice, a packet of frozen spinach, a lettuce, a chocolate and a bottle of oil.  

Years of shopping in Israel, has proven that this is not the case.  Israel has many brilliant mathematicians, but for some reason 8 does not equal 8 any more. In the Israeli supermarket 8 items equals:  two loaves of bread, a packet of cheese, a bottle of fruit juice, 4 packets of frozen spinach, a lettuce, 6 chocolates and 3 bottles of oil.  So in Israel, it appears that 8 items actually means 8 categories.

The cashiers

The cashiers are mostly very pleasant.  They have a hard job – they have to discipline the shoppers and keep the peace but mainly it is their job to up-sell and get you to buy a whole lot of unplanned, extra and unnecessary items at the check-out.  

If the cashier has befriended the clientele of a small neighborhood store, be patient, it’s good customer relations to know how the client’s children are doing at school, grandma’s wellbeing, who’s coming over on Friday night and what’s on the menu.

Packing groceries

In some countries, where labour is very cheap, there are grocery packers who relieve you of this tricky task.  In Israel there is no-one to pack your groceries or push your shopping cart to your car in exchange for a small tip – you have to do this all yourself.

Payment Options

You’ve bought more than you planned, and this trolley load is going to cost a lot more than you anticipated.

At the check-out till, you will be offered an immediate cash or credit card payment option. You also have the option to pay on installments (Heb: tashloomim). It does not make sense to eat it today and pay for it in 6 months time.  If you get into a habit of shopping this way, you’ll make impulse buys thinking that you’ll have the money sometime down the line. 

Club & Loyalty Cards

Most supermarket chains these days have club-membership loyalty cards which entitle you to a few points or a small discount. You need thousands of points to get a 20 shekel store discount.  Some of these club-cards are combined with credit cards as well and where standard credit card fees apply.

Supermarket & Store Shopping Hours

In the days of street shopping, before shopping malls sprung up, stores were open 6 days a week – Sunday thru Friday.  Most stores were closed between 2pm and 4pm – siesta time – and reopened at 4pm – 7pm. Stores were closed on Tuesday afternoons and also closed on Fridays at around 2pm.

These days, Tuesdays are just regular shopping days and the afternoon siesta mostly doesn’t exist.  Most shopping malls are open between 9am and 10am and are open up till 10 or 11pm at night.  Banks and post-offices have their own hours.  Friday is a busy shopping day, so be prepared for long queues and agitated shoppers.

Home Delivery Services

A large percentage of the Israeli population do not have motor cars or convenient transport, so for around 30 shekels, supermarkets will deliver your groceries right to your front door.  This is a great service.  Tipping the delivery person is optional but recommended – 5 shekels for a small delivery or 10 for a large one is my common practice.

Online supermarket shopping, offered by the large supermarket chains,  is very convenient as well.  Once you’ve placed your order you can choose one of two options – 1) in store pickup or 2) home delivery.

Product Labeling

Most, but not all items have English labeling these days.  If the product is manufactured in Israel, the English labeling is likely to be very basic – it is getting better though.  Bad label translations, from Hebrew to English, are quite funny and make for delightful shopping moments.

Leading supermarket brands

• Telma and Osem for dried foods.  Some of the Knorr products, we know from back home, are kosher and available here.
• Tnuva, Yotvata, Strauss and Tara for cheese, milk and dairy products.
• Zoglovek, Tirat Zvi and Yehiam for processed meats
• Maadanot, Shloshet HaOfim and also Zoglovek for frozen, ready to bake, sweet and savory, pastry items
• Elite for chocolates and sweets.
• Sano and Nikol for paper products and cleaning materials.

Of course there are many other local brands offering top quality food and household items.

Imported brands

You’ll find Heinz, Hellman’s, Nestle, Lipton’s, Barilla, Skippy, Oreos, Tim-Tams and a large selection of other imported items.

Hard to find items

Just some; Marmite, fish paste, Colemans mustard in a jar, Hershey’s and golden syrup.  There are a host of websites where you can order specialized items.  Shopping online has become the solution to our comfort-food cravings from back home.

Local House Brands

The leading supermarket chains have their own house-brands which are mostly a little cheaper.  Try them out.  Not all of them are fabulous but you might be able to save a bundle if you are prepared to compromise.

Typical Israeli/Middle-eastern supermarket items

Favorite Israeli foods include falafel, hummus, tahina, boerekas, malt beer (non alcoholic), Crembo chocolate (similar to a “Beehive” – whipped marshmallow on a biscuit base, covered in chocolate), herbs and spices like cumin, sumac, zaatar and hawaij.  Flavored fruit syrup concentrates for beverages (petel or- blackberry is best loved by Israeli children), Silan – date syrup (can be used instead of honey or golden syrup), Bisli – a local crunchy snack tolerated before the invention of Lays and Doritos.  Shkadei Marak – soup almonds, eaten in soup or by the handful.  Watch out for tartrazine or E102 . Let’s not forget Beigela –  they have nothing to do with a bread beigel from the old-country. Actually beigela are salty pretzels in a wide variety of shapes and sizes.  By far the most popular snack, and now also on supermarket shelves in many countries abroad, has to be Bamba.  Bamba is a puffed wheat snack flavored with peanut butter. Israeli children learn to eat it in infant-hood almost as soon as they can grip anything. Your doctor might encourage you to give your ailing child some Bamba – he’ll eat that if nothing else. No birthday party is complete without Bamba and adults love it too.  There are a few competing peanut butter flavored snacks but for the connoisseur, Bamba reigns supreme.

Israeli dairy products are known to be among the best in the world. ‘ Leben’ and ‘Gil’ (a cross between buttermilk or paneer, yogurt and soured creamed cheese). Dani and Milky compete for first place, they are a chocolate flavored treats in the refrigerator section of the supermarket, next to the yogurts.  Quite delicious!

Everyone loves labaneh – a smooth white cheese, traditionally from goat’s milk and often served with rich green olive oil and zaatar

From the Eastern-European Kitchen

• Don’t ask for kitke, lokshen, kichel, chopped herring, teigelach, pletzelach, imberlach (or any other -lach, you can think of)
• Kitke is Challah
• Lokshen is “Itriot” (noodles)
• Kichel and chopped herring (make your own)
• Teigelach (available in specialty stores in Raanana and very expensive)
• Pletzelach and imberlach (sweets our bobbas made for Pesach) – make your own or remember them with great fondness.
• Cholent is also known as Hamin (from the Sephardic kitchen)
• Chreime (fish cooked in a spicy tomato sauce) is to the Sephardim what gefilte fish is to the Ashkenazim 
• Ghrain (horeseradish) – ask for Hazeret

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