By: Michael Steinberger
Whether in France, California, or Israel—all pictured here—or any of the world’s other top viticultural regions, the processes employed in the production of fine wine are much the same. Those are also the methods used to make the new, exciting, and impressive kosher wines, which are winning accolades while offering excellent alternatives to the sweet, sticky nectars we are accustomed to drinking at the holidays.
Not so long ago, articles about kosher wines almost invariably included gently mocking references to Manischewitz, that treacly staple of the Jewish holidays. The gibe had a certain logic: For most people, Manischewitz was synonymous with kosher wines. That may still be true, but it’s time to give the joke a rest.
Once a deeply unfashionable niche, kosher winemaking is today a thriving segment of the global wine business. Not only are Israeli wines attracting growing international prominence and acclaim, but good kosher offerings are being produced in France, Australia, California, New Zealand, and other major viticultural regions. Some of the wines are downright excellent. It used to be that drinking kosher meant sacrificing quality; that is emphatically no longer the case.
Kosher has even become fashionable in Bordeaux, arguably the most important wine region of all. Several of its top vineyards—Château Pontet Canet, Château Giscours, and Château Léoville Poyferre—are now making kosher versions of their celebrated wines. So is Château Giraud, a leading producer of sauternes (the sweet white wine of Bordeaux). There’s even a kosher wine from Château Valandraud, probably the most influential and respected of Bordeaux’s so-called “garage” wines (a cluster of small châteaux centered around the Saint-Emilion appellation producing rich, deeply colored, modern-style wines that have revolutionized Bordeaux and scandalized the region’s Old Guard).
The emergence of so many quality kosher cabernets and chardonnays has created a surge in demand. According to the Nielsen Company, which tracks consumer trends, sales of kosher wines in the United States topped $28 million in 2007, continuing the steady growth shown over the last five years and a dramatic increase from just a decade ago. Gary Wartels, owner of Skyview Wine & Spirits, a Bronx, N.Y.–based retailer offering one of the largest selections of kosher wines in the country, says that his Internet sales doubled in 2007 and that in-store sales also significantly increased. While admitting that kosher wines still require a certain degree of hand-selling—a lot of his clients instinctively go to the nonkosher section when they want to buy first-rate wines—Wartels says that the vastly improved quality and selection are making many converts. “There are a lot of Reform Jews who want good wines but who would also like to support the kosher movement. This is giving them that chance,” he says.
A growing demand for quality kosher wines is part of a broader trend: Americans are becoming more passionate and knowledgeable about wine and less willing to accept mediocrity in the bottle. But supply-side factors are also playing a part: With more and more countries turning out good wine, producers are looking for new ways to differentiate themselves in a crowded marketplace. Adding a kosher offering to the portfolio is one way of doing that.
The number and variety of kosher wines now available is remarkable: Argentine malbecs, Australian shirazes, Israeli cabernets, South African pinotages, New Zealand sauvignon blancs, California chardonnays, Chianti classicos, red bordeaux, white burgundies. Quantity, of course, is not synonymous with quality, and many of the wineries now producing kosher offerings are not terribly distinguished. But there are some seriously good kosher wines being made, particularly in France and Israel, and as these wines continue to do well in the marketplace, other high-quality producers are introducing their own.
Producing a kosher wine is no simple matter because the laws of koshering are nothing if not exacting (see sidebar, opposite). Fortunately, there is now a standing army of globe-trotting kosher winemakers willing and able to help wineries take the plunge.
Royal Wine Company, based in Bayonne, N.J., is the largest producer and importer of kosher wines in the United States; it also owns California-based Herzog Wine Cellars. Royal’s European operations are overseen by Pierre Miodownick. Although the 53-year-old winemaker now resides in Antwerp, Belgium—not exactly a place overflowing with vines—he is a native of Béziers, France, in the heart of the wine-rich Languedoc region. Born into a family of nonobservant Jews, Miodownick became interested in wine in his mid-20s, began working for several local merchants, and studied viticulture and enology. In 1982, his training, combined with a growing interest in Judaism and the realization that quality kosher wines were practically nonexistent in France, led him to try making one in the Languedoc’s Minervois appellation. In 1986, fortune shined on Miodownick not once but twice. First, he was approached by Baron Edmond de Rothschild, the banking titan and staunch Zionist, to make a kosher wine in Bordeaux, where the baron owned Château Clarke and had holdings in several other properties. The 1986 Barons Edmond et Benjamin Rothschild Haut Médoc was the first kosher wine from the Médoc, the heart of Bordeaux wine country. That same year, Miodownick was hired by Royal Wine to head up its winemaking in Europe.
Today, he leads a team of around 35 Sabbath-observant Jews (schomrim) who make wine under the supervision of the local staff at 15 to 20 estates in France, Spain, and Portugal. Over the past 25 years, Miodownick has seen a revolution in kosher winemaking, on both the consumer and producer side. In the mid-1980s, there was a lot of skepticism about whether kosher-keeping Jews, accustomed to sweet, inexpensive wines, would be interested in drier, costlier ones. That question has now been answered: He says there is a strong and growing appetite for top-quality kosher wines, and a corresponding intolerance of subpar ones. “You can’t put a bad kosher wine on the market now—consumers will just say no to it,” he says.
Consumers are also willing to pay. Royal offers a kosher 2004 Batard-Montrachet (a grand cru white burgundy) in Europe for just under $300 a bottle. And it is selling.
Miodownick also says interest in kosher wines among producers has grown dramatically. He attributes this in part to competitive dictates, but also to the professionalism of today’s kosher winemakers. “In the beginning,” he says, “it was hard to be accepted at the châteaux. There were hurdles to overcome. But we have developed good relationships, and they now accept all our mishugas.” Château owners now approach him about making kosher wines, a reversal from 25 years ago when he was the supplicant. Miodownick thinks there’s even a possibility that one of the First Growths—the five wines (Latour, Margaux, Lafite Rothschild, Mouton-Rothschild, and Haut Brion) that sit atop the Bordeaux hierarchy—will eventually come out with a kosher wine. That would be the ultimate coming-of-age moment.
Château Malartic-Lagravière, in the Graves region of Bordeaux, is one of the estates that Miodownick works with. The château was acquired in 1997 by a Belgian family, the Bonnies, who renovated the facilities and turned what had been one of the area’s consistent laggards into one of its rising stars. In 2003, Malartic-Lagravière produced 500 cases of a kosher version of its red bordeaux, made of 45 percent cabernet sauvignon, 45 percent merlot, and 10 percent cabernet franc, and it did the same in 2004 and 2005. Jean-Jacques Bonnie, the château’s 34-year-old owner, says the decision to produce a kosher wine was a response to growing demand and his desire to have a good example from the region. But he also thinks the growing number of kosher cuvées reflects a new spirit in Bordeaux. “Fifteen or 20 years ago, maybe the great Bordeaux wines weren’t as open-minded to the world,” he says. “Competition from New World wines obliged us to improve our quality and open our minds, to find new ways of reaching different parts of the world. There was a real interest in kosher wines, and it was a quality niche, a quality audience.”
Along with France, the other—and perhaps most interesting—story is what’s happening in Israel, where the country is undergoing a wine revolution. Twenty-five years ago, Israel was a viticultural backwater, its handful of estates producing generally insipid wines. Today, several hundred wineries, from the Golan Heights to the Negev, are turning out a bevy of world-class reds and whites.
According to the experts, the best quality wines are coming from the Golan Heights, the Upper Galilee, and the Judean Hills, an area near Jerusalem that has seen the emergence of a number of well-regarded boutique wineries, notably Domaine du Castel, which has become one of Israel’s marquee estates. The explosive growth in output, and the dramatically improved quality, have not gone unnoticed. Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, the most influential consumer wine guide, recently did its first comprehensive tasting of Israeli wines, and the results were impressive: Of the nearly 100 wines reviewed, 14 received 90 points or above (on Parker’s famous 100-point scale), and many others scored in the high 80s. As far as wine goes, Israel is now officially on the map.
One of the people who helped put it there is Victor Schoenfeld, the winemaker for Golan Heights Winery. His 2005 Yarden Heightswine (Yarden is the winery’s premier line), a dessert wine made of gewürztraminer grapes, received 93 points from Wine Advocate, the highest score awarded any Israeli bottling. A 44-year-old native of Southern California, Schoenfeld earned a degree in viticulture and enology from the University of California, Davis. After working in California (for Robert Mondavi) and France (for the champagne house Jacquesson), in 1992 he took over at Golan Heights, which had been in business for just eight years. Despite the winery’s brief history, Schoenfeld had been impressed with its early efforts, and like many people he believed that Israel—with its Mediterranean climate and hilly topography—had enormous potential. But attempting to make wine in Israel back then required a certain frontier spirit and quixoticism. “It was the Wild West at that time,” he recalls with a laugh.
That’s all changed, and in an astonishingly short period of time. “We’ve reached a critical mass of good quality producers,” says Schoenfeld. Among the others that experts cite are Carmel, Barkan, and Castel.
As for Golan Heights, it is not just a source of fine wines; it is also one of the most innovative wineries in the world, using high-tech tools to better understand the soils and microclimates in which its grapes are cultivated. (The winery has a network of 11 meteorological stations scattered throughout its vineyards.) All of Golan Heights’s wines are kosher in that they are made by Jews but are neither flash-pasteurized nor boiled. But Schoenfeld says that Golan Heights would much prefer to be regarded as a great winery that happens to be kosher than as a kosher winery that happens to produce fine wines. That, he says is how his wines are perceived in several major foreign markets, notably Germany, Scandinavia, Japan, and Italy. The problem is the United States, where Golan Heights’s offerings are invariably relegated to a wine store’s kosher shelves. And even with the soaring interest in kosher wines, this deprives the winery of the recognition and demand that it might otherwise have.
And what of the kosher wines being made in Schoenfeld’s native California? It is a mixed picture. Gan Eden, a longtime and well-regarded kosher producer based in Sonoma, closed in 2005 after owner Craig Winchell decided to relocate to Los Angeles because he wanted better Jewish education opportunities for his children. But right around the same time, Herzog Wine Cellars opened a 77,000-square-foot production center in Oxnard, about an hour’s drive up the coast from Los Angeles. The facility is equipped with the latest winemaking gadgetry and includes a tasting room, restaurant, and gift shop, all offering a full complement of kosher California wines: cabernets, merlots, zinfandels, chardonnays, and chenin blancs under the brand names of Baron Herzog and Herzog Reserve.
In all honesty, some are better than others. But assuming the number of kosher producers worldwide continues to grow and the overall quality continues to rise, competition will yield better and better wines. That is a remarkable turn of events for a category of wines that was producing little but laughs not too long ago.
Michael Steinberger is the wine columnist for Slate and a contributing writer for the Financial Times. He is writing a book about the future of French cuisine.
