Kosher Wine & Spirits

The sound of the popping cork.  Foam sliding down the shaft of the glass bottle.  Champagne knows how to make quite an entrance.  It is always in fashion, goes well with most everything and is the life of the party.  Sparkling wine can be white, red, pink, sweet, dry.  Its various disguises share one common trait…  Bubbles. (more…)

At a Thanksgiving dinner, the most important question is usually white or dark.  At my Thanksgiving dinner, it is white or red.  Choosing the perfect wine for Thanksgiving does not have to be intimidating.  There are a number of wines that pair quite nicely with the classic menu of turkey, stuffing, sweet potato or pumpkin pie, green beans and cranberry sauce.  Unlike Passover, where our wine drinking is often measured by quantity, on Thanksgiving we can focus on quality and sharing our favorites with friends and loved ones.  (more…)

It took a while, but California winemaker and rock music impresario Bruce Cohn finally decided to go kosher.  At least he is giving it a try, with the release of the 2008 Trestle Glen Estate Cabernet Sauvignon.  According to Bruce, “I figured after 25 years of making wine with the name ‘Cohn’ on the bottle, why not have a kosher wine for that segment of the market?”  It was worth the wait.  Daniel Rogov, wine and restaurant critic for the Israeli daily newspaper HaAretz, just gave the wine 92 points and kosher wine lovers are buzzing with excitement.  “We think it’s a good, solid kosher wine,” explains Bruce, “and being as though we grow the grapes, we know that you can’t make great wine if you don’t have high quality grapes, so that’s where we begin.” (more…)

As a Jewish traveler, I must admit I had my reservations prior to visiting Germany for the first time.  Two nights and three days at the Munich Hilton for Oktoberfest 2007.  I went for the beer, the music, and the lederhosen.   I Ieft with an appreciation for the spirited renewal of Jewish life in this historic city, a taste for lager and a hangover. (more…)

Let’s get this out of the way right now, Rosé is not White Zinfandel, you can’t make a Rosé by blending red and white wines together (although some exceptions exist for French Champagne) and if you are hoping for bubblegum and cotton candy flavors, you will be sorely disappointed.

Rosé wines are actually made from red grapes.  Common varietals used to make Rosé include Cabernet, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Grenache, Tempranillo, Sangiovese, and Syrah.  The style is dry and fruity, without the cloying sweetness you may have expected by looking at the glass. The reddish hue of the wines comes from the length of time the juice of the grapes remains in contact with the skin of the red wine grapes.

Rosé is naturally low in tannins, which makes it a great choice for people with allergies to red wines. A Rosé is best served chilled and is very food-friendly, so it is a welcome guest at a summer picnic or backyard barbeque.

Rosé is enjoying a renaissance in popularity over the past several years. A wine retail study conducted by The Nielsen Company in 2009 reported that U.S. retail sales of imported Rosé wines rose by 42 percent, compared with a less-than-five-percent increase in total retail sales of all table wines during the same period. In France, sales of Rosé now exceed sales of white wine!

Kosher winemakers are responding to this trend and have expanded their Rosé offerings in recent years. If you are ready to begin exploring the world of kosher Rosé you may want to try the

2006 Barkan Classic Shiraz Rosé (Israel) which has aromas of cherry, plums and honey and a dry, crisp finish.

2007 Galil Rosé (Israel) is a blend of 65% Sangiovese, 22% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 13% Syrah. This wine is dry and lively with attractive aromas of fresh strawberry, rose petals, citrus fruit and spices.

Mony Sunny Hills Rosé (Soreq Valley, Israel) is made from Cabernet Sauvignon and fermented in stainless steel, it has floral and fruity aromas and a long finish.

2009 Lanzur Rosé (Chile) is an affordable, young wine with an intense fruity aroma featuring fresh herbs and citrus notes.

If you like something a little sweeter, try the

2008 Beckett’s Flat Five Stones Margaret River Rosé (Margaret River, Australia) showing off some ripe strawberry fruit with a pinch of spice and a lemony finish.

Don’t be afraid to think pink this summer and try some of the newest kosher Rosé selections available from your favorite wine shop!

Pairing kosher wine with a kosher cheese is an art, not a science. Like all food and wine combinations, you should be guided by good taste and don’t be afraid to experiment. The possibilities are endless and you can be as creative as you want.   Make your guests an offer they can’t refuse, as a prelude to a festive Italian dairy meal, enjoy a selection of kosher Italian cheeses like Montasio, Parmigiano and Provolone , marinated olives and roasted peppers and a glass of a Borgo Reale Toscano Rosso or a Bellenda Prosecco.

To help inspire you, the editors of joyofkosher offer a few easy rules to remember when pairing kosher wine and kosher cheese.

Keep It Simple

Pick one distinct wine and one distinct cheese that pair well. For example, full-flavored cheeses, such as creamy washed rind cheeses require medium to full-bodied wines, such as the Dalton Safsusa Merlot, the Hagafen Zinfandel, or Yarden Syrah. Likewise, pair light cheeses with light wines, such as the Bartenura Pinot Grigio, or the Galil Mountain Pinot Noir.

Go Local

Pair wine and cheese according to the area of origin or even the local region. Just as the growing conditions impart particular characteristics (called “terroir”) to a region’s wines, these same characteristics may be imparted to the cheeses through the vegetation on which the animals graze.

Sweet and Bubbly

Do not limit yourself only to still table wines, but branch out and try sparkling wines, late harvest and sweet wines, as well as fortified wines such as sherries and ports. In particular, blue cheeses pair extremely well with dessert wines such as the Teperberg Sliver Late Harvest White Riesling or a Mony Muscat. Aged cow’s milk cheddars would be a perfect accompaniment to the Tio Pepe Sherry. Also, creamy cheeses pair well with sparkling wines and Champagne.  The ElviWins Adar Brut Cava would be an ideal choice, as the bubbles help to cleanse the palate and refresh it for another bite.

Don’t Have a Cow, Man

Explore the varieties of cheeses based on their sources of milk. For example, fresh goat cheeses are mild, lemony, and somewhat acidic in their flavor profiles and creamy in texture. They pair well with crisp white wines, such as a Gamla Sauvignon Blanc, Ella Valley Sauvignon Blanc, Goose Bay Pinot Gris, and the Hagafen Lake County Riesling.   Aged sheep’s milk cheeses pair well with something dry and spicy like the Willm Gewurtztraminer or the Herzog Special Reserve Zinfandel.

One Bourbon, One Scotch and One Beer

Remember that wines aren’t the only beverages that go well with cheese! There is an ever-growing number of artisanal and craft beers, craft ciders and premium alcohol widely available that create interesting and fresh flavor combinations, which will also inspire you to experiment and broaden your culinary horizons.

After all the cleaning, cooking, table setting and frantic preparation for the Passover Seder is over, you might think the easiest part of the meal would be opening a bottle of wine.  But for some of us, after the Four Questions comes the dreaded fifth… “Cabernet or Chardonnay?” We invited four special guests to gather around our Joy of Kosher table to share their recommendations for the four wines to serve on Seder night.

Ari Erle is the founder of Israel Wine Company and an international winemaking consultant.  Ari has worked at several famous wineries in the Napa Valley, such as Colgin Estates, Clos Du Val and O’Shaughnessy Estate Winery.

Gary Vaynerchuk is a self-trained wine and social media expert who has revolutionized the wine industry with his unconventional, often irreverent commentary on wine and his creative use social media tools like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to reach an untapped audience to promote his video blog Wine Library TV and his family’s New Jersey wine shop.

Jay Buchsbaum is the Director of Fine Wine Education for Royal Wine Corp., the largest producer, importer and distributor of kosher wines and spirits in the world.

Kosher wine is traditional for the Passover seder, so what goes into that making that bottle? To keep with tradition, those who may not keep kosher will enjoy kosher wine, but not too many people consider all that it takes to create kosher wine. It all starts with Concord grapes, which naturally have a bitter taste, so bottlers add large amounts of sugar to sweeten the wine.

And then there is the difference between kosher wine that uses boiling to purify it (Mevushal), and the newer “flash pasteurization” method which does the same thing, yet preserves the taste. However, by not boiling it, the “non-Mevushal” wine can lose it’s kosher status if handled by a non-Jew. The Mevushal is exempt from this and can be poured and enjoyed by all, regardless of religion.

Just remember that just because it’s a kosher wine doesn’t automatically make it an award winning wine. Ask around, ask friends, ask your rabbi! Now that wine producers are hastily realizing the surge in popularity of kosher wines, and creating more choices, wine stores will be more than happy to assist your purchase. L’Chaiyim!

Like most American-born Jews born before 1980, I grew up associating kosher wine with sweet, Manischewitz kiddush wine. To me, Friday night still isn’t the same without it, but the kosher wine industry has taken huge leaps forward over the last two decades, and top quality table wines are available from just about every continent.

In Israel, most tourists are familiar with the Golan Heights Winery in Katzrin and Mizrachi Carmel Winery in Zichron Ya’akov, but dozens of boutique wineries have cropped up in Israel’s highland areas over the past decade, including more than a few kosher ones. Drive Israel features a self-guided driving tour of some of the finest ones in the northern region, and six out of the nine wineries are kosher. One place that didn’t make it onto the list, Dalton Winery just north of Tzfat, produces some of the finest kosher wine currently on the market.

In the Jerusalem area, the Gush Etzion Winery is located 15 minutes south of the capital, and features a classy dairy menu to boot (local tip: they also make one of the best cappuccinos in the area!). To the east, Hamasrek is located just off the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway, on Moshav Beit Meir in the lush
Jerusalem forest. Domaine du Castel (Ramat Raziel) Tzora Wines (Kibbutz Tzora) also provide high-quality wines in limited numbers. In both Jerusalem and the north, larger operations offer regularly-scheduled tours and wine tasting, but those wishing to visit smaller operations are advised to call first.

On the internet, several portals have made international kosher wines accessible and affordable. The Kosher Wine Review is exactly what the URL says it is: a comprehensive review of virtually every kosher wine in the world. In addition, Finest Wine has a magnificent selection of kosher Italian and French table wines, and Australia-based Kosher Wine features information about Beckett’s Flat and Teal
Lake, the country’s two kosher labels. Another useful portal is Israel Wines (site loads in Hebrew, but there is a link to the English-language content on the right side of the page).

For newcomers to the intricacies of kosher wines, the high holiday period brought on a flurry of “introduction to kosher wine” articles, including several from unlikely sources. Oddly enough, the Twin Cities (Minnesota) Daily Planet featured an informative, well-written overview of kosher wine, and of kashrut in general for the uninitiated. The Jerusalem Post did the same a week earlier, as did a nifty-looking Atlanta-based e-zine called Creative Loafing.