Kosher Wines: A Primer

With the Jewish holidays starting, I’ve been reading a lot about kosher wines, which have made major strides over the last several decades to overcome their reputation as the sickly sweet tipples of yesteryear’s blessings. As a case in point, a kosher wine—the Carmel Winery Kayoumi Single Vineyard Shiraz 2008 beat some of the world’s most renowned syrah and shiraz producers at the Decanter World Wine Awards last week in London.

I knew nothing about kosher wines until a couple of years ago, when I coordinated a tasting for a local Jewish organization enlisting the help of Royal Wines, one of the largest importers, producers, and distributors of kosher wine in North America. Here’s what I learned.

For a wine to be kosher (meaning pure), it must be produced according to strict rabbinical law and in accordance with the kashrut (dietary laws). A Sabbath-observing Jew must handle the entire process.

Each ingredient added, whether during vinification, filtration, or clarification must be kosher. Fining (part of the clarification process) is done with a clay material called bentonite and not with animal or dairy products such as gelatin or egg whites. All tools and equipment must be dedicated to kosher winemaking.

There are two types of kosher wine—non-mevushal, a basic kosher wine, and mevushal, which is fit for the most orthodox wine lover. Non-mevushal wines must be produced, handled, and even served by Sabbath-observant Jews in order to retain their kosherness. Meshuval wines undergo an additional step of flash pasteurization, in which the wines are subjected to heat (not boiled) during the winemaking process. As a result, the wines may be handled by non-Jews and remain kosher. The bottle label should indicate whether the wine is mevushal or not.

Before the tasting began that night, our audience shared their skepticism about quality expectations, driving home the message with a steady stream of jokes about “Man-O-Manischewitz” and other wines of that ilk, which were traditionally made from Concord grapes with generous doses of added sugar to balance the acidity.

In a message yesterday, my good friend Andrew Pritzker enlightened me further, explaining that the old school wines—Manischewitz, Mogen David, and Kedem—are more like grape juice. With their syrupy body and overly sweet taste they typically are only broken out for religious services, not served as a cocktail or a preferred choice of wine.

These days Jews can administer their blessings with respectable, food-friendly kosher wines produced in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina, Chile, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Hungary, and Israel. These wines are made from any number of grape varieties—some familiar, some obscure. They can be dry or sweet, sparkling or still, white, red, or rosé, light and cheerful, or dark and brooding.

Here are some names to look for at your local wine shop:

Baron Herzog: California
Flecha Los Andes: Argentina
Teal Lake: Australia
Alfasi and Alfasi Reserve: Chile
Chateau Leoville Poyferre: Bordeaux, France
Laurent Perrier: Champagne, France
Chateau de la Tour Clos Vougeot Grand Cru: Burgundy, France
Langer Reserve Tokaji: Hungary
Domaine du Castel, Carmel Winery: Israel
Bartenura: Italy
Goose Bay: New Zealand
Casa da Corca: Portugal
Rothberg Cellars: South Africa
Elvi Adar: Spain

Tags: Wine | kosher