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In Midtown, where there was once a kosher food desert, there is now a vending machine stocked with fresh Kosher meals. The heckshered contraption is meant to serve the Jews working inside Midtown Manhattan’s 10 W 33rd Street, but folks hankering for a kosher salad and smoothie can slide past security towards the haven of kosher food, delivered from Brooklyn’s Avenue U to the center of modern day tourism.

A photo of the machine, via Yeah That’s Kosher

For kosher customers who have long since accustomed themselves to passing up fresh meals in favor of soggy homemade sandwiches and sad bagged lunches, a kosher vending machine is a happy change. It’s a sign of an industry willing to cater to specific religious dietary specifications, even in areas with more sky scrapers than kosher butchers. While spoilage and kosher inspections have always been issues that hindered the concept of ready-made, machine-delivered lunch, it seemed it was time with kosher food market trends set to double by 2021. The vending machine isn’t the first of its kind, though it’s the first of its location, in 2007 the Hot Nosh 24/6 was installed at Torah Academy of Teaneck to shoot out fresh-baked knishes.

Shira Feder is a writer. She’s at feder@forward.com and @shirafeder

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