DavidDuck, If you think that introducing some superficially correct facts regarding latitude or climatic conditions into your polemic will add some patina of accuracy or integrity to that dross you are mistaken. There must be someplace where you can receive the treatment you so obviously need. You have a problem, deal with it.
Hi Bruce, glad that you had a good time. I have no wish to bang on about this point too much, just want to rectify a common misconception; there is no such thing as a Rabbi’s blessing making a wine Kosher. No Rabbi’s are involved in the process (unless of course they happen to have a day job working at a winery!). It is the entire process of making the wine according to the laws of Kashrut that make a wine kosher.
Ah so that’s the problem. As I suspected, your issues are not really about wine at all. Stop being so disingenuous. It is not a good trait and unwelcome in polite society, as is your rudeness.
Well I don’t take in on faith; I taste and drink and compare and come to rational conclusions (as far as that is possible given that taste is something of a subjective matter) about what is good, what is not and that which is merely OK. Israel produces wine that fits into all of the preceding categories. Most other wine producing countries do too.
The wine industry in Israel is not static and has changed hugely for the better in the last 20 years. I have no doubt that it will evolve and mature. I can only wish the same for you.
I have asked my rabbi (and others) whether making a wine Mevushal is really making it not wine. If so, how can it be used in blessings. I have never gotten a really good answer to this question.
I drink Kosher (mostly now Israeli) wines on Passover seders because it makes the the night different from all other nights. It is, to me, part of doing things differently on Passover. It also gives me a chance once a year to try Israeli wines and see what is happening with them. I had an Ella Valley Vineyards Chardonnay and Merlot - Merlot was 2007, I think the Chardonnay was 2013. Ok, but nothing special in both cases.
Thanks for your thoughts on Israeli wines. I am interested in any other thoughts you have. I have not had Castel, but Petite Castel is the best wine from Israel I have had. I once had a taste of Yatir Forest (at a Synagogue tasting before Passover) and was not as impressed with it - maybe it was too young.
Castel is great. Arguably the best wine in the country on the basis of how it tastes young. Somewhere in the ebob archives there are notes on a dinner where I brought the 2001 as a blind bottle and a few people guessed it as a Pichon Lalande. But I had that same vintage again this weekend (my last bottle) and now it’s just eh. My hope is that as the vines get older, newer releases will show more for the cellar time than the older ones did. There are other wines in the country that don’t taste quite as classic as Castel on release but have a track record for doing very well in the cellar. For example, I did not like the 2003 Yarden El Rom on release, which the late critic Daniel Rogov had flipped over, because I found the oak overpowering, but a bottle I opened about a year ago was absolute dynamite. I am also a big fan of the Margalit Special Reserve (cabernet ‘hermitaged’ with some old vine petite sirah).
Howard, this is not a comprehensive list but happy to share some thoughts.
The ones that I find consistently reliable are Castel (Grand Vin and Petit Castel and Rose. The GV needs 5/6 years before it hits it’s stride, I am not generally a fan of the white ‘C’ Chardonnay)
Flam (but not the entry level Classico)
Margalit (Not Kosher, big wines which need time)
Recanati ( a large range which has hugely improved over the last few years and pretty much everything works at it’s price point. Particular favourites of mine are the dry farmed Wild Carignan, the Syrah Viognier and the Levanon vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon.)
Carmel (at the cheaper end it’s ‘Appellation’ range is good value for money and offers some interesting varietals whilst at the top end the Carmel Limited Bordeaux blend can deliver some very nice drinking given 6/7 years ageing. In addition the Kayouni Vineyard Shiraz can also be very nice)
Yatir (The best wine here is the Yatir Forest. It needs 5/6 years)
Tzora (I particularly like the Misty Hills and Shoresh reds)
Dalton (produces a large range and is good value for money in the mid-price range but hasn’t managed to convince me at the upper end)
Domaine Netofa (doing some interesting things with varietals associated with the Southern Rhone)
Yarden (not really a fan although they did so much to improve the standard of wine making in Israel in the 80’s and 90’s. The only wine that I buy there now is the Blanc de Blanc and older bottles of the Botrytis Semillon if I can find them)
Pelter/Meitar (this one is interesting. Pelter has been around for some time and produces good wine. It is however not Kosher. The guys there decided that they needed a Kosher brand for economic reasons and 2/3 years ago set up a parallel but separate winery next door called Meitar which is Kosher. It is too early to know if the reds are going to be as good as the ones produced at Pelter but I have been drinking and enjoying the Sauvignon/Semillon blend and the Chenin Blanc)
Shvo (not Kosher. Some nice Chenin Blanc and also a Southern Rhone red blend)
Lewinsohn( Not Kosher. A real garage operation; Ido Lewinsohn actually makes his ‘Garage du Papa’ red and whites in his father’s garage in Hod HaSharon. This is Ido’s part time gig. In his day job he is one of the principal winemakers at Recanati).
I am sure I have left some out. If you have any questions please let me know
Finally a comment on your experience with Ella Valley. I have tried more than a few wines from this winery over the years… I get served a lot of them at other peoples homes… and I have struggles to find one that I really liked.
Hope this helps.
Thanks. For me, this is a joyous holiday (celebrating going from slavery to freedom), but one where you should shake things up and deviate from your normal routine, esp. for seder. Francophiles try Italian or California wines for a change of pace; California wine lovers may try wines from Spain or Argentina. Why shouldn’t Jews try wines from Israel at least once a year.
Those older vintages of Castel oddly didn’t age well - I’ve been poured a couple at dinners by folks who bought them to age, and they really had declined since their youth. Also, the QPR on Castel is rough these days.
If this is the “greatest hits” list, then the situation speaks for itself. I urge you to try these wines blindly alongside non-Israeli (and non-Kosher) wine so that you can understand how deficient the situation in Israel is. It is almost akin to Bordeaux in the 70s or something like that - just a comprehensive failure, top-to-bottom, to make good, age-worthy wine.
David, you are really a bit of a tit. I drink a great deal of non-Kosher and non-Israeli wine and know exactly what comparisons to make. The situation in Israeli is not deficient because it can only be deficient measured against itself. It is incomparably better than it was 20 years ago. The analogy with Bordeaux is flawed because that was an example of a superb wine growing area that had lost it’s way and fallen from previous heights. That is the sort of specious thinking in which you appear to specialise.
My list wasn’t a ‘greatest hits’ list, that how you have chosen to represent it so that it suits your agenda. it was a list of israeli wine that I like, full stop. Of course other countries make wine that is better and guess what they also make wine that is worse. That is a long way from your asinine and childish statement claiming that “Israeli wine is shit”. Given that you can’t work out that there is a huge difference between making ‘age worthy’ wine and ‘shit’ there doesn’t seem to be any point in continuing this dialogue.
I think it’s childish to insist that Israeli wine isn’t shit with the faint praise of “its incomparably better than it was 20 years ago”. That is not mutually exclusive with the wines being shit today. If no wines are shit, then no wines are great. What is remarkable about Israeli wine is the curious insistence that the wines must be good because its Israel and therefore the wines are good. Whether or not I root for the laundry - whether or not I hope the wines are good (and I’d kill to have a good bottle of Israeli wine, or kosher wine that isn’t Royal swill) - has nothing to do with whether the wines are good. To my knowledge none of the champions of Israeli wine have ever put those wines up, blind, against similarly priced bottles from other regions in the world. And we know how that tasting would go, because we are all constantly making excuses for execrable Israeli wine.
Same for me. I use Passover as a way to experience wines and regions (Israel) I generally don’t drink. It makes it fun and it is way better compared to manischewitz.
