IT’S A-LIST kosher with a Brooklyn twist.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu feasted on $1,800 worth of food from Pomegranate, a block-long Jewish grocery store in Midwood, during his most recent jaunt to New York.
Bibi’s choice in chow follows other big name Pomegranate fans, including Ivanka Trump and violinist Itzhak Perlman, who’ve downed the made-on-Coney Island Ave. meals.
“When the prime minister comes to us, it validates what we do,” said Pomegranate owner Abraham Banda, 46, a Satmar Hasid from Williamsburg. “We are the kosher Whole Foods. Everything we do is the best.”
Netanyahu’s staff ordered a 10-person spread from Pomegranate while the Israeli leader was in town for the UN General Assembly. One of the prime minister’s aides goofed by telling supermarket workers that the eats were for the Israeli leader.
Word quickly spread and was later reported by the Jewish Press. Banda gave The News an peak inside his presidential quality digs and detailed what Bibi noshed on.
“I was very excited,” said Banda, showing off pictures of some of the platters made specifically for Netanyahu — rare prime rib, a mountain of cold cuts topped with rose petals and grilled fish on a bed of mixed greens.
“They were impressed that a Hasidic kosher place makes this type of food.”
Workers also sent dishes popular with Brooklyn shoppers, including gefilte fish, chopped liver, and matzoh ball soup to the Sept. 28 Shabbat meal reportedly held at the Lowes Regency Hotel in midtown.
“They wanted to have traditional food,” said deli manager Shloime Leitner. “They told us it was for Bibi, so we made it extra special.”
Pomegranate serves about 3,000 cooked eats each week prepared in their three kitchen, which sits on top of the 18,000 square-foot market that also sells everyday products from milk to toothpaste.
A fourth cook room, the “ha-mish kitchen,” is down the street and run by Williamsburg Satmar chef David Tirnower, who oversees the making of old-world foods like “grieven” — fried chicken skin selling for $7 for a small box.
But it’s the expensive and rare fare that attracts Pomegranate’s deep-pocketed following.
Beef jerky goes for $95 per pound. “Kosher bacon,” or smoked lamb, is $39.99 per pound. A jar of goose confit is $50 and a tin of blue caviar is $100.
Still, most of Pomegranate’s customers live around the neighborhood and are unimpressed with the store’s growing fame.
“I rarely buy fruit here, they don’t know how to pick it,” said Ed Clarke, 69, from Flatbush snubbing a bin of apples as he browsed the aisles last week. “I don’t care for the prepared foods. I can do better by myself.”
By Simone Weichselbaum / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
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