A recent article, “What’s ahead for wine drinkers in 2008”, written by Laurie Daniel for the San jose Mercury News is an interesting read, with 4 predictions listed below. Not much for me to add but I do want to comment on #3.
1. Domestic wines should look more attractive as prices rise on many imports.
2. More companies will start touting how “green” their wines are.
3. We’ll see more wines from ever-more obscure places.
4. Some wine producers will become more transparent about their winemaking practices.
When referring to the “obscure places” in #3 Daniels mentions places in Countries like Italy & Spain that once was not considered to be a wine producing region and now is. She proceeds to mention countries such as Croatia, Bulgaria, the former Soviet republic of Georgia and even goes so far as to contemplate the possibility of wines from China.
I am interested in this prediction (isn’t it really an already proven trend?) as it relates to another “obscure” region…yup, ISRAEL! While Israel can not even be mentioned in the same breath in terms of size, I think the recent Wine Advocate feature on Israeli wines both confirms Daniels suspicion that new, previously unexpected wine regions will emerge in the not too distant future AND that Israel should be included in the list of “obscure places”.
Keep your eyes open…premium Israeli wine MAY be coming to a shelf near you sooner than you think…
Happy happy everybody…
WTG.
Tags: 2008, Israeli Wine, Laurie Daniel