Israel Is On The Move

What do Israel and California have in common? Their wine-making philosophies. While they are hundreds upon thousands of miles away from each other geographically, Israeli wine connoisseurs have to deal with many of the same weather issues as Californian vintners do and they base much of their wine philosophies off of California grape growers.

What really compelled me to write about this is that I love hearing about up and coming wine regions. Like when I wrote about British wines and their rising popularity a few weeks ago. While I always love knowing that I can fall back on my favorites, you can’t just stick to those. Trying new wines is the key to developing your palette.

One quote that I saw in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle said “[Israeli wineries] advocate growing wine, not growing grapes.” I must say that is the way to go. While grapes are the bread and butter of wine, there is still so much more that goes into the wine process and I think that sometimes vintners loose that. They stray away from the basics, from what they know. Perhaps this is the main reason for the recent focus on Israeli wines. They don’t stray, they use their knowledge to do what they do best.

I must say, I am excited to go out this week and find some Israeli wines and have a little tasting myself. Do any of you have some recommendations for me? I would love to hear them. I will comment on this entry later with my finds and what I thought about them.