Frequently Asked Questions

Browse the menu, add items to your cart and go to checkout. Enter your contact details, choose home delivery or pickup and pick a delivery date and time, then place the order — you don't pay yet. The Kitchen reviews your order, and once it accepts, we email you a secure payment link. The Kitchen starts preparing your food once your payment is confirmed.

Currently your cart is limited to items from a single Kitchen per order. If you add an item from a different Kitchen, you will be prompted to start a new cart.

You can cancel an order yourself until your payment is confirmed: open it under Orders in your Kotimaku account and choose Cancel order. Once you have paid, the Kitchen starts preparing your food, so contact us as quickly as possible if something needs to change and we will do our best to help. Orders can't be edited after they are placed — cancel and order again instead.

You pay through a secure Stripe payment page, using the link we email you once the Kitchen has accepted your order. The payment page shows the methods available to you, such as debit and credit cards. Your payment details are handled by Stripe and never stored on our servers.

Everything is made to order, so you choose a delivery or pickup date and time at checkout. The earliest time on offer depends on how long your dishes take to prepare and on the Kitchen's opening hours — some dishes need several hours or more. Each dish shows its preparation time and earliest delivery on its page and in your cart.

Yes — home delivery is charged per order based on the distance between the Kitchen and your address. The exact fee is shown at checkout once you enter your address, before you confirm. If the Kitchen offers pickup, choosing it means no delivery fee.

We are sorry to hear that. Contact us within 24 hours of delivery with a description of the issue and we will investigate with the Kitchen and offer a resolution, which may include a full or partial refund.

Each menu item page lists allergens declared by the Kitchen. Look for the allergen tags below the item description.

Allergen information is provided by Kitchens and may not account for cross-contamination. If you have a severe allergy, contact us before placing an order so we can check with the Kitchen, and describe your allergy in the note for the kitchen on each dish in your cart.

Sign up for a cook account, complete your kitchen profile, and add your menu items. Your kitchen will be reviewed by our team and, once approved, will be visible to customers.

Kitchens are paid twice a month. Orders completed from the 1st to the 15th are paid on the 16th, and orders completed from the 16th to the end of the month are paid on the 1st of the following month.

Listing your kitchen is free, and during our launch Kotimaku charges 0% commission — you keep the full price of every dish you sell.

In most cases, yes. Selling homemade food regularly through an online marketplace counts as food-business activity, and Finnish Food Authority (Ruokavirasto) guidance on distance selling states that a food distance-selling business — including one run from home — must be registered with your municipal food control authority. Contact your municipality before you start selling regularly through Kotimaku.

Finnish law allows a limited exemption for minor, occasional low-risk activity by a private person, and there is a separate pop-up restaurant model that can run without registration for up to 12 days a year — but that model does not allow delivery to customers. Neither is a general permission for regular online meal sales, so confirm the registration requirement with your municipality rather than assuming an exemption applies to ongoing Kotimaku sales.

They are two separate registrations. A Business ID (Y-tunnus), obtained via YTJ or PRH, registers you as a business for tax and legal purposes. A food-business notification, submitted to your municipal food control authority (often through the ILPPA e-notification service), registers your specific food activity. Having one does not mean you have the other — most regular sellers need both.

Contact your municipality and describe what you plan to sell, where you'll prepare it, how often, and whether customers collect it or you deliver. Registered food businesses normally submit the notification — often via ILPPA — at least four weeks before starting or before an essential change to the operation, and keep the authority informed of significant changes, closure, or a change of operator afterwards.

It needs to support safe food handling: safe water and handwashing, clean and intact food-contact surfaces, enough fridge/freezer space without overcrowding, separation of raw and ready-to-eat food, pest control, and business food kept apart from everyday household cooking, pets, children and cleaning chemicals. What counts as suitable depends on what and how much you prepare — baking is lower-risk than cooking meat-based meals daily.

If you handle unpackaged perishable food — raw meat, fish, milk, chopped vegetables and similar — you need a Hygiene Passport no later than three months after you start that kind of work (time in comparable previous jobs counts toward the three months). You get one by taking the official test through an examiner approved by the Finnish Food Authority. Some sellers may also need a health status statement covering salmonella — check with your municipal authority.

Own-check is your own food-safety risk-management plan — how you prevent problems with receiving ingredients, storage, cooking, cleaning, cross-contamination, allergens, packaging, delivery, and what you do if something goes wrong. Every food business needs one sized to what it actually sells, backed by real records such as temperature checks and cleaning logs, not just a document that sits in a drawer.

Cook food thoroughly, cool it quickly if it isn't served straight away, and keep perishables refrigerated — Finnish Food Authority consumer guidance generally puts refrigerator storage at about +2 to +6°C. Keep hot food hot and cold food cold through packaging and delivery, wash hands and use clean utensils, and don't prepare food for customers while unwell. Different dishes can carry different requirements, so build your own-check around your actual menu rather than one generic rule.

At minimum: an accurate food name and description, the key ingredients, and every allergen the dish actually contains — including allergens hiding in sauces, spice mixes, stocks or toppings. Keep a written recipe for each item, update the listing whenever a recipe or supplier change affects that information, and never make medical claims, such as saying a food treats or cures a condition.

Use packaging intended for food contact and suited to the dish — its temperature, fat content and acidity — with clean, intact containers that won't leak or let contamination in. Plan how long food can safely sit between cooking and handover, use insulated equipment and keep hot and cold items separate where needed, and cover delivery delays or temperature-control failures in your own-check plan.

Typically your Business ID and business details where applicable, evidence of your food-business notification or registration, Hygiene Passport information where it applies to you, and identity and payout verification. We may follow up for clarification or updated documents, and can restrict or suspend a listing that turns out to be inaccurate, unsafe or non-compliant.

No. Our review checks your profile, menu and the compliance information you've provided, but it doesn't replace registration, inspection or approval from your municipal food control authority. You're responsible for meeting the legal requirements for your activity before you start selling, whether or not Kotimaku has activated your kitchen.

Keep your menu, ingredients, allergens and prices accurate, and update them before selling a changed recipe. Keep following your own-check procedures and records, keep your business and food-control registrations current, report significant changes, handle complaints or suspected food poisoning appropriately, and stop offering anything you can no longer prepare or supply safely or legally.

Food control in Finland is handled locally by each municipality. The Finnish Food Authority (Ruokavirasto) publishes a contact page listing the food control authority responsible for each area — start there, or ask your municipality directly.

We've put the detail — registration, hygiene passport, own-check, labelling, and packaging & delivery — into a Seller Onboarding & Food Business Compliance Guide, available as a download once you start onboarding a kitchen. It's a practical guide, not legal advice — for an authoritative answer about your specific situation, contact your municipal food control authority or the Finnish Food Authority (Ruokavirasto).