Archive for March, 2008

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Yatir: The terroir and story behind the wine

31, Mar 2008

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One of the most important things in wine is the terroir – basically a fancy word for climate and soil. One of the most fascinating things about Israel is that there is the lowest point on Earth – the Dead Sea (sorry, no wine there!) to high mountains in the Golan Heights. In addition, Israel [...]

This is Israel

31, Mar 2008

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(Actually Israel has much better wines than the low-end of Tishbi, but this is a cool picture; hat tip IsReally)

Israeli wine is coming to U(S)

30, Mar 2008

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It suddenly seems like the secret is out. Israeli wine is coming near you – if it’s not already (another reason to move to Israel!). In addition to Israeli Wine Direct, whose wine should be shipping to California today, there is also a new Israel wine club called Israel Wine Company. (Note that I am [...]

Two Israeli wine events in New York

27, Mar 2008

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Passover is coming and this is a major time for kosher wines from around the world. As a result, this is a great opportunity to explore some Israeli wines. Again – while not all Israeli wines are kosher, most aren’t available in the US and don’t be scared off by the label – in fact, [...]

Two exciting new Israeli wines

26, Mar 2008

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One of the great things about the up-and-coming Israeli wine world is that there are always new surprises and new improvements. Old wineries are dramatically improving and new wineries are releasing revolutionary new wines.
Currently, the only sparkling wines in Israel are méthode champenoise (“traditional method”) from Pelter and the Golan Heights Winery (both a Brut [...]

New Wine in Old Bottles

25, Mar 2008

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Ella Valley Winery

24, Mar 2008

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Ella Valley is another excellent terroir-driven winery that is making excellent wines in Israel. Ella Valley, founded in 1997 on Kibbutz Netiv Lamed Hay, produced around 150,000 bottles for the 2006 vintage.

 
Run by French-trained winemaker Doron Rav Hon, the grapes all come from nearby vineyards and are harvested at night, to ensure high quality. The [...]

The kosher conundrum + not all Israeli wines are kosher, not all kosher wines are Israeli

21, Mar 2008

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I have said this before and I will say it again: Israeli doesn’t equal kosher and kosher doesn’t equal Israeli. That is to say a very simple thing – not all Israeli wines are kosher and not all kosher wines are Israeli.
 Why am I saying this AGAIN (and will keep on saying it)??? Two simple [...]

Domaine du Castel

19, Mar 2008

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It’s quite possible that Domaine du Castel makes THE best wine from Israel. Unquestionably, they make some of the best wine in the world. I first encountered the wines of Castel only last year, when I was asked to write a story on them for ISRAEL21c, which you can read here. While there, I tasted [...]

Chateau Golan Winery

17, Mar 2008

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Chateau Golan is a small, boutique winery on the Golan Heights. While its modeled after a French chateau, its winemaker was trained in Oregon. Unlike the Franco-phile Domaine du Castel, which is truly making French-style wines, it appears that the Chateau Golan’s decision, with its glorious but, I suspect, expensive façade is a decision of [...]


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