Golders Green

Last night, after visiting a number of usual tourist places such as the Churchill Museum, Buckingham Palace, and Westminster Abbey, Matt and I took the tube to a little suburb in northern London called Golders Green.

Golders Green is known to have a thriving Jewish community, especially a strong heredi (Othodox) community.

As we walked down Golders Green Street (an easy name to remember), we visited a number of Judaica shops. We found a few interesting books and a really cute netilat yadaim cup (a cup for hand washing, this one had a floral motif) that were really tempting, but we had to consider our already stuffed bags and pass them up.

We were in the neighborhood with a specific goal -- dinner. We were searching for a particular kosher Chinese food restaurant, but we were tempted by each kosher restaurant that we passed. We finally ended up eating at one that described itself as South American cuisine.

There were lots of interesting choices on the menu. We did order chicken empanadas for an appetizer, but went for basic chicken and steak for our main meals. And it was delicious! It's been several days since we've had any meat so it was particularly yummy :) They also had super good bread and a dip appetizer - makes my mouth water just thinking about it.

It was so nice to visit this kind of community. As we were eating dinner we could watch out the window. There were lots of people visiting the kosher butcher across the street, young boys with tzitzit racing by on foot-powered scooters along the sidewalks, and young couples out on dates.

It was just so comfortable. Matt said it was just a taste of what it's going to be like in Israel. We can't wait! We stopped at a kosher bakery on the way back to the tube station and picked up some challah; Shabbat in London should be interesting!