Archive for the ‘Israel Wine’ Category

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European Wine prices going up – another good reason to drink Israeli wine

Monday, April 7th, 2008

OK, so who really needs an excuse to drink good Israeli wine anyway 😉

But seriously, with prices for wine increasing worldwide, now is a great opportunity to try some Israeli wines you may not have previously considered.  I bring up the “surge” in European wines as a result of reading an article in the NY Post.  The article quotes buyers who have called the price increases “insane” and talk about the “magnitude” of European wine prices.

Other factors leading to higher prices throughout the industry are the drought in Australia and the illegal worker act in California.  All these factors are leading to higher costs that are now being passed along to the consumer.

Back to Israeli wines for a second, these too have slowly risen in price of late.  But aside from a few standouts many of the best Israeli wines found in the US today have remained at a steady price point.  Also, keep your eyes out for new wines from Israel being brought into the US over the next several months.

Sorry to be the barer of rough news, but their is always a silver lining.  Discovering that new “hot” region before it gains public recognition and its prices subsequently increase –  means trying lots of new wines, and who doesn’t enjoy that?!

Happy new wine region tasting!

WTG

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Kosher Wine Extravaganza – Unusual (but gooood) wines

Sunday, March 30th, 2008

kfwe_forward-020.jpg

(Picture of Aron Ritter – founder of KOSHER WINE SOCIETY)

I attended the “Kosher Wine Extravaganza” today in Manhattan sponsored by Gotham Wines, one of the largest retailers of kosher wine.  This was the 5th year that this event was held and there seem to be more wines each year.  Out of well over 100 wines I managed to taste 81 of them followed by some Cognac (which I was told I was not allowed to spit) to finish things off.

I could write about the fabulous Israeli Cab or the not so fabulous French Bordeaux, the overrated California red, or awful Israel Merlot (it was BAD) but who cares?!?!! Merlot, Cab, Syrah – been there done that. Come on Wine Tasting Guy, give us something unusual.

Well you want unusual, you got it! (more…)

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Wine expert – what are the qualifications??

Friday, March 7th, 2008

I attended a wine event this evening. It was a charitable event featuring Israeli wines – my passion as those of you who have been reading for a while know. I know one of the organizers and asked if he wanted my assistance. He was happy to have me & informed me that he planned the event with some other people who are connected to Israeli wines. I knew whom he was speaking of reached out to said people. I simply volunteered to step in, should a question arise, that my hands-on Israeli winery expertise qualified me to handle, possibly something the others were not prepared to respond to.

While my offer was originally politely declined, I felt it my duty both as WINE TASTING GUY and as ISRAELI WINE GUY to attend. And I was happy that i did. My enthusiasm for Israeli wines seemed to possess a magnetism of sorts. I spoke with many people throughout the evening about topics ranging from Israeli wines in general, to more specific Israeli boutique wineries, as well as the idea that wine from Israel is (and should be) Israeli wine and not kosher wine – as is often the misconception. I was proud to have felt like I made a difference in helping to educate people. And the feedback I received was tremendous.

I hope you will all excuse me for a quick yet important diversion. This is not a political BLOG, and as such I do not want to get into current events. That said a travesty took place in Israel today when 2 terrorists infiltrated a Jerusalem Yeshiva (school for Judaic studies) and opened fire – killing 8 and injuring scores of others. I am not sure what to say other than that my prayers and thoughts are with the families of those who lost loved ones or who have loved ones presently fighting for their lives.

It is very hard to write about something like wine (and to maintain focus on something such as wine) at a time like this. But they say that the way to fight terrorism is NOT to let it affect &/or change ones normal routine. As such I will get back to the topic at hand.

Moving on from the more difficult subject of terrorism, let me get back to something I feel much more comfortable discussing. WINE…

OK, so tonight’s topic is “wine expertise”. I bring this topic up as at tonight’s wine event I was given a name tag that labeled me as an “Israeli Wine Expert”. And I was astutely asked by several people what qualifications I posses to be labeled an “Israeli Wine Expert”. Forgetting about me for one second, what i would like to discuss is – what qualifies someone as an aficionado to discuss &/or educate others about wine (or anything for that matter). Is it drinking a lot of it? Is it the desire to be an “expert”. Is it schooling? Maybe it is “street smarts” or as the case may be “winery smarts” – knowledge obtained through hands on experience???

I do not know. I am merely an aspiring connoisseur. I can only speak for myself. And for me, short of attending one of the world renowned schools of oenology & viticulture, I received a degree from the Wine & Spirits Education Trust, a certification in Wine Sensory Analysis from the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley, but MOST IMPORTANTLY (in my very humble opinion) – I rolled up my sleeves and worked 10, 12 & 14 hour days in vineyards and wineries both in Napa Valley & Israel. While I will readily admit that I am far from an “expert” I do feel that my passion and hard work has positioned me to address many of the questions that those who seek to learn more are interested in.

I wish you all happy wine tasting, drinking, learning & most importantly Peace & health!

Sadly soberly yours-WTG.

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Casual wine tasting

Monday, February 25th, 2008

A real quickie today…

A friend threw a very casual wine tasting at his place on Saturday night.  He bought about 12 bottles, I brought over 4 and people brought their own.  No theme to the tasting, just grab a glass and pour yourself some stuff.

Stuff I noticed which I found interesting.  There was a guy there who liked white but not red and some ladies who had no interest in white and would only drink red.  Found that to be a little role reversal.  So much for stereotypes.

Everyone was responsible with their drinking.  Parties such as these are easy to pull off in Manhattan as there is sufficient public transportation for getting home.  One girl acted out a bit – seemingly a reaction to too much wine, but otherwise a fine time was had by all.

I was designated pourer for many people and as such I was privy to people’s reactions to the wine and ONLY the wine (they did not see the bottle, label, price, etc.).  Two of the favorites were an Israeli Cab/Merlot blend from the newly imported Ruth Winery.  And the other was a Chilean Cab made by Caliterra.  Both very fine wines indeed.

Final point I want to make about the evening touches on a point I raised just the other day that was confirmed by a guest.  It was a gentleman who indicated that he knows very little about wine.  I responded that what is most important is that he recognize what he likes.  He proceeded to tell the story of a snobby, pretentious and overall demeaning sommelier who completely turned him off from wine for many years.   He apparently is SLOWLY re-opening up his mind to wines, but the incident left him feeling that his wine knowledge was so inadequate that he’d be better off avoiding wine altogether.  SAD.  I hope I was able to shed a more positive light on industry people to this person.

I will be attending a more formal Rioja wine tasting later this week and look forward to sharing the results and feedback…

Have a wonderful & wine filled week!

WTG

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Wine Deal – another Aussie Shiraz – AND …

Tuesday, February 19th, 2008

Although $37 is a lot for a bottle of wine, when others are selling the same bottle for NO LESS THAN $45 and as much as $70 the $37 price tag doesn’t seem so bad.

The Two Hands ‘Harry Edward’s’ Shiraz being sold here for $37 was given positive ratings by both Wine Spectator (91) and Robert Parker (91).

I haven’t tasted this wine so I don’t have much more to say about it…

…but I have A LOT to say about all these Australian wines reaching stratospheric (relative term, I know, but…) prices.   Australia has long been known for economic wines of high quality.  Many of these previously “well priced” wines have since taken their receptive audience, high scores & raised their price to the “luxury” level.  In addition to these luxury wines, many of the under $20 and even under $10 bottles of Australian wine wil likely be raising in price in the near future.  The weakening dollar is affecting all wine imports – Australian wines included.  Furthermore however, Australia has been dealing with a severe drought which has led to much smaller than usual fruit output.  Which means producers will be making less wine & the supply of Australian will be down.  Simple economics tells us that as long as the demand is there, as the supply goes down the prices will be driven up.

I bring this up as I think that this will be one of several factors leading consumers here in the US to try wines from new regions (hello Israeli wines), maybe ones where the price may suddenly make the wines much more appealing relative to their Australian brethren.

Remember, keep an open mind about wine & drink what you like!

WTG

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Israeli wine tasting – Castel & Binyamina

Thursday, February 14th, 2008

The Kosher Wine Society hosted a tasting tonight with Israeli winemakers from the Castel & Binyamina wineries.

The evening started with a 2004 Sauvignon Blanc from the Binyamina winery.  Sauv Blanc, when not oaked, is generally a wine that should be consumed young.  As such this wine was nice and pleasant but a little over the hill and mostly indistinct.

Once everyone arrived we were treated to a very special talk by Eli Ben Zaken, the winemaker (together with son Eytan) and proprietor of Domaine du Castel.  Castel is among Israel’s best boutique wineries (producing approximately 100,000 bottles) and has received very positive reviews for their wines of late.

Eli gave an insightful talk about Israeli wines, the Israeli terroir, industry and varying winery philosophies.  The guests were then treated to The “C” by Castel 2006 Chardonnay.  Castel’s Chard is very well regarded.  I personally thought the nose hid the purity of fruit with it’s smoke (1/3 new barrels) and cream (full malolactic fermentation).  But the mouthfeel, balance, minerality and long luscious finish must be why the “experts” love this wine so much.  Very nice.

We then tasted both the 2005 Petit Castel & Grand Vin from Castel.  Again I had problems with the nose on both.  I found the Petit Castel had a heavy herbacious/green bell pepper nose.  I know many people love this characteristic, but I really only like it in very small doses.  As to the Grand Vin, although it had at least 1 hour in the glass to aerate, I still found it to be mostly closed.  It showed some subtle black fruit, earth & spice, but it was too subtle and probably could have used some decanting.   That said, the mouth-feel on both wines was great.  Really well balanced, soft gripping tannins, fruit & earth.  Yum!  Very nice wines.

We ended the evening with a brief talk by Assaf Paz, the winemaker from Binyamina.  Assaf joined Binyamina less than 2 years ago and I am confident that Binyamina has exciting times ahead.  While the guests drank a 2006 late harvest gewurztraminer Assaf talked about the challenges in producing late harvest wines.

All in all it was a very nice and charming evening.  The winemakers were all very engaging and were happy to answer questions. And oh yeah, there was even some cheese and crackers.

I encourage you all to go check out these wines.  You’ll be happy you did!!

WTG

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Blind Tasting

Thursday, January 31st, 2008

I just enjoyed another article written by Laurie Daniel for the San Jose Mercury News. This one titled “Blind tasting Can Be A Real Eye-Opener”. OK, the title is a little old-man-pun style, and the article was written citing some recent research done by Standford Business School and California Institute of technology (regarding how price influences people’s appreciation of wine)…but she sheds some light into wine appreciation. And as an advocate of blind tasting, I like to see other people touting its unique ability to force people to appreciate what it is the glass as opposed to its label, reputation or price tag.

I like blind tasting for a multitude of reasons. As someone who DOES NOT profess to having a master palate it is OK when in a blind tasting I pick a (supposedly) inferior wine over one priced much higher or said to be much more highly regarded.

I also like blind tasting as a result of an experience from my time working in the lab at a Napa custom crush. There was a producer who made their wines there that consistently had trouble maintaining the natural balance of their wines. They would doctor the heck out of their wines just to get them into better balance. Yet these same wines carried a triple digit price tag and a reputation to match. Proof that marketing, a high price tag, or for you conspiracy theorists – paying off critics, is enough to “fool” consumers. (One of the many reasons why I STRONGLY advocate tasting wine YOURSELF and buying wines YOU like – not those you are told you should like).

The last reason I’ll mention here as to why I am such a fan of blind tasting has to do with my affinity for Israeli wines and my STRONG belief that they are STILL under appreciated. We Israeli wine people joke that simply being “Israeli” means that critics will (subconsciously??) deduct 3-5 points from their scoring of the wine. Oh how I would love to set up a blind tasting for well known critics and sneak a few Israeli wines in with some other New world wines.

Bottom line, read the Laurie Daniel article, and know that when you are contemplating that $100 bottle vs. the $30 bottle, yes you may enjoy the $100 bottle more – but it will only be BECAUSE it cost you $100 and NOT because you were drinking a better wine…

Now how do you go enjoy that $500 bottle of Bordeaux after reading that…????….SORRY!

Happy drinking!

WTG.

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Blogging from the Israel Wine World

Thursday, January 17th, 2008

I’ve been thinking a lot about what to blog about tonight and two controversial issues come to mind, relating to the following two topics:

1 – Internet sales of wine

2 – Wine ratings/reviews

The first, internet sales of wine has come up as there is presently a very exciting project underway to sell Israeli wines online. While I believe that the project will ultimately be successful I have urged my contacts to be realistic in their expectations. It has also come up in the “wine world” of late given a little controversy surrounding wine.com and how the wine.com CEO has been very vocal in pointing out that there are many retailers illegally shipping wines throughout the US.  This was written about in Wine Spectator in an article “Wine.com Conducts Sting Operation Aginst Other Retailers“.  I’ll blog about this further as it becomes more relevant.

Wine ratings & reviews has come up as everyone in Israel has an opinion when it comes to the recent Wine Advocate review of israeli wines. I can probably write a book on this topic just based on conversations I have had the last week here in Israel. BUT, what I want to touch upon is something a bit more controversial (and interesting). It was expected, and realized that many of the wines would receive scores a few points lower than the wineries would have liked – OR, then local wine critics have given. At the same time something UNEXPECTED HAPPENED, there were a few wines that received scores higher than people here are used to seeing from the specific winery. How could such a thing happen??? Lower scores, OK – it was expected. But higher scores????

N O, accusations were not made. BUT, it was pointed out that there are WAYS of “tricking” wine critics. Especially when the critic is not familiar with the wine AND/OR the wine is not available in the market where the critic resides (so they can’t simply go to the store and buy a bottle). One such method can be perpetrated when the winery, during the barrel aging process, discovers that one barrel is responding particularly well to a given wine. Rather then blending that barrel in with the rest of the batch, the barrel might be bottled separately, and those bottles might be put aside for personal use AND WINE REVIEWS.

Again, there were no accusations & knowing many of the winemakers & wineries I do not believe that this took place. I am simply blogging about something which COULD take place and that is much more interesting than telling you about how great the winemakers are, how beautiful the country is, and how darn COLD it has been here since I arrived.

OK, enough controversy stirring for me for one night. Have a fabulous weekend wine drinkers of the world. I will be enjoying lots of Israeli wine this weekend with all kinds of special friends. I suggest you do the same!!!

WTG.

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Wine Industry Professionals

Tuesday, January 15th, 2008

It is after 3AM and I have not slept much since getting to Israel 5 days ago. I do not want too many days to go by without blogging, so while thinking about what to write tonight I thought about the people I have been meeting with on my trip – mostly Israeli winemakers. Now Israelis can be tough people, but for the most part I LOVE the people I have met who work in the trade here. The same can be said about those what worked in the trade while I was working in Napa. Generalizations are just that, general statements that are never 100% true, but for the most part the people that choose to get into the Wine Industry seem to be people who generally love wine and get into the business so that they can love what they do. Which leads to happier, warmer and overall more likable people.

What of the WINE SNOBS or KNOW IT ALLS??? – they are out there. I have visited and been to many wine bars where I was so turned off by the people that worked there that I vowed never to go back again. And truth be told there are wineries and winemakers in both California and Israel whom I met and did not like one bit.  Sure that is life, not everybody gets along, but it has been my experience that people who share a common bond (such as wine) have an easier time hitting it off.

Sorry for the barely wine related post. Just what was on my half asleep mind at the moment.

Happy Monday and L’Chaim from ISRAEL!!!

WTG

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Going GREEN with your wine drinking

Friday, January 11th, 2008

I arrived in Israel a little more than 36 hours ago and I’ve already begun to run around the country to meet with my wonderful friends in the wine business out here. I’ll be heading into the Judean Hills region today but I wanted to put together a real quick post before leaving.

A recently really an interesting piece written by Dr Vino (drvino.com) AKA Tyler Colman that I found in the NYT published on Dec 30, 2007 called Red, White or Green?

In the article Colman discusses the “carbon footprint” of a bottle of wine or as he explains it the “amount of carbon dioxide (that) is emitted in its production and transportation”. While I will not get into the politics or personal preference for saving the environment, I do want to quote some interesting facts Colman points out.

  • A Napa Valley wine can emit 2.6 pounds of carbon dioxide on its journey from growing the grapes, making the wine and transport to San Francisco
  • The same bottle making the truck trip to Connecticut (or elsewhere on the east coast, say New York City) would emit 5.7 pounds of carbon dioxide in total.
  • Holding the growing method, winery practices and bottle size constant, it is more carbon-efficient for people in Connecticut to drink a bottle of wine from Bordeaux than from Sonoma. The short truck route on both ends of the efficient miles of container shipping means the French wine has 50 percent less carbon dioxide emissions, about three pounds.

Now, the French and many of their European counterparts are selling us wine at exorbitant prices already, and the weakening dollar is making those already expensive bottles even MORE expensive.

SO, we should not be buying wine from California because of carbon emissions, we can’t afford to be buying French and other European wines (let along wait for them to be mature, or ready to be drunk), so where does that leave us???

GOOD QUESTION! I think this is where the concept of drinking wines from lesser known winemaking regions comes into play. And I bet you know where I’m going now….yup, DRINK ISRAELI WINE!!!! Most israeli wines are made in a New World Style so you don’t have to lay them down and wait 10+ years to soften and be ready to drink. And Israeli wines are more carbon friendly than our own domestic Napa wines – at least for those of us residing on the East Coast.

Remember, drink Israeli wine!!!

Have a fabulous weekend.

WTG.

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