On August 7th, Nova Market & Café, Nashville’s only kosher market, will celebrate its first year. Located in Bellevue, the market is run by Vered Arony and her daughter Ornit Arony. Together, this mother-daughter duo offers kosher goods, serves homemade Israeli food, and hosts a variety of Jewish events. Over the past year, amidst the challenges of opening a new business and surviving a Nashville ice storm, Nova has grown, beyond just food, into a thriving community hub.
Born in Israel, Ornit and her mother opened Nova as a space for people to come together, eat, and experience a taste of Israel’s warm Jewish community, right here in Nashville. “My mom calls it mini Israel here,” said Arony.
As its name suggests, Nova hosts a market and a café. The market is stocked with Israeli brands and other kosher goods, including a variety of meats like chicken, beef, turkey, hot dogs, sausages, and cold cuts. Every morning in the bakery, Vered bakes homemade, fresh goods like challahs, bourekas, rugalach, and more. Nova also caters, offers food to-go, and serves sit-down meals in its café area.
Stacy, a first-time customer stopping by the market from Houston, Texas, described how finding a kosher market in Nashville was a huge blessing. She mentioned the difficulty of finding kosher food for her family while traveling. “Getting access to this is a huge advantage,” Stacy said, “and having somewhere to get hot food is so beneficial for the Jewish community.”
Nova has also grown into something much deeper than food; it has grown into a vibrant hub of Jewish family and home. “I thought that Nova would be a market, but it’s completely changed,” Arony said. “It became another community spot.”
Nova has hosted a variety of events, including music nights, pizza nights, a challah bake, Jewish holiday celebrations, and ladies’ and men’s events. It also provides a space for regular group meetings, like Mahjong. On Fridays, from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., Nova offers its “No one eats alone on Shabbos,” where the tables are set with tablecloths, flowers, and candles, for people to enjoy an early Erev Shabbat space with others.
Nova also hosts a Hebrew language group once a month. Amber Beckham Northrop, a lifelong Nashvillian, shared how, with Ornit’s support, she started a Hebrew meet-up at Nova to learn Hebrew and practice with other fellow learners.
“None of us are teachers,” Northrop said, “but what I love about it is that we incorporate local Israelis who speak Hebrew into the meeting.” Together, over dinner or cups of coffee, the group learns and supports each other. Nova is “truly a blessing,” Northrop shared. “[Arony is] a light to the city by opening her doors and having such a warm heart to everyone.”
Over the past year, Nova also experienced its share of challenges. In January, Nashville experienced a major ice storm that left thousands of homes and businesses without power. It left Nova without power for ten days and more than $20 thousand lost in refrigerated and frozen food.
“But the beautiful thing is that the community came together and they did a GoFundMe, and they raised $17 thousand,” said Arony.
Even though the ice storm was a challenge, it also showed the community’s support for Nova. “It showed us the community does care, and they do want us here,” Arony said. She is deeply grateful to everyone who donated, expressing a special thank you to one donor, anonymous even to her, who donated $7,000.
Ornit and Vered have built good relationships with the neighboring shop owners, whose religious backgrounds include Christian, Muslim, and Bahai. “We love each other,” Arony said. “I send them customers, they send me customers.” She described how in the Israeli community, everyone knows everyone. “In Israel, there’s no way you don’t know your whole block.”
People and community are the beating heart of Nova. Throughout the interview, Arony often paused what she was saying to welcome in a new customer, crack a joke, or thank someone for coming. Several customers stopped to talk, including multiple local regulars, and two returning customers from South Africa. “There’s always someone to talk to,” she shared. “We do it all here, everything from the friend to the therapist, we see all of it.”
On one wall of Nova hang the framed faces of people lost in the wake of October 7th. Arony shared how each person on the wall was chosen because “they have a direct relation to the people that live here in Nashville.” Hanging on the wall straight across from them is another collage of faces: people who are part of Nashville’s Jewish community. Both walls show how, amidst the constant tension of both pain and joy, the Jewish community in Nashville is still strong. Nashville’s Jewish family is still connected, and always ready to share good conversation over a plate of Nova’s fresh, homemade Israeli hummus.
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