Attention: Major Media Outlets
To whom it may concern,
Every spring, major newspapers and other media sources offer their requisite nods to the Jewish holiday of Passover. As the holiday’s central ceremony — the seder — commands the consumption by each participant of four full glasses of wine, journalists have discovered that they could annually review kosher wines for the benefit of their semitic readership and the general cultural edification of the less-Hebrewed.
While those of us in the kosher community certainly appreciate this effort — especially in a country only two percent Jewish, and where only a fraction of that group actually cares about exclusively drinking kosher wine — it is time to put to rest the oft repeated lamentation about the sweetness of traditional kosher wines, in contrast to the variety and quality of those rabbinically-approved quaffables now available from far-off locales like Israel, Chile, Australia, and France.
I do not deny that my family would religiously imbibe Manischewitz’s alcoholic syrup — Extra Heavy Malaga, no less — to sanctify the year’s many Jewish festivals. Certainly, the ubiquity of sweet wines in the American Jewish experience was the reason why Joan Nathan, in a 1981 Passover-themed article for the Washington Post, first remarked, “For my part, I was shocked when I learned that my in-laws do not consider the kosher Israeli dry cabernet sauvignon a substitute for Manischewitz sweet.”
And for more than two decades since, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, the Washington Post, the Independent of London, the Toronto Star, the Los Angeles Times, the Baltimore Sun, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Jerusalem Post, the Orlando Sentinel, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Diego Union-Tribune, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Denver Post, USA Today and many others have used this reliable, but now tired observation to mark many Passovers and any kosher oenophilic milestone to hit the news.
Suffice it to say: we get the point. Though many of us still enjoy our wine on the sweet side (the relatively new Moscato trend a perfect example), everyone who cares about kosher wine knows that there’s ample dry stuff to choose from.
Keep the coverage. Lose the cliche.
Respectfully yours,
The Kosher Blog
Well said! Given the ubiquity (and, actually, dominance) of high quality/high end kosher restaurants, products for home use, and yes - wines, it is unfortunate that the media (and Jewish media outlets are included in this) insist on hearkening back to the days of yuch. In fact, it is almost harder to find a casual, mid-priced restaurant in NYC than it is to find a fancy one (something that could perhaps be discussed elsewhere). Needless to say (or perhaps as has already been said much more eloquently by Jabbett), the kashrut ship has landed and brought with it some wonderful bounty for us foodie Jews - the media are officially excused from having to remind us of this - but keep the reviews coming, they make us feel appreciated.
Should I be embarassed that I did, indeed, use Manishewitz for the four cups? I really enjoy a good glass of wine, but with the seder requiring almost a gulping of wine, I hated to waste the better wines in a way they could not be enjoyed. I saved the good bottles for the last days of Pesach, when I & my guests could properly enjoy a decent wine.
No reason for embarrassment, SLS. We also used the sweet Almog (Carmel, I believe) for the four cups because of the gulping and (egads!) spilling. The issue that we’re discussing here, though, is that the rest of the world would do well to stop thinking of the pancake-syrup version of kosher wine as the baseline - that stuff is increasingly becoming a novelty, or at least relegated to the suitable-only-for-kiddush category.
I’d just as soon they think we’re still drinking the grape soda with a kick. That way, they’ll ignore our wines and leave more on the shelf for me. :)
One searches in vain for a well-written article about kosher wine that doesn’t act SHOCKED that there are indeed excellent kosher wines. HELLO?!! Where have the reviewers been for the last decades?! Let’s hope we can lose the hackneyed annual putdown of kosher wine.
Based upon casual observations of a wide variety of local Jews purchasing wine, both for Pesach and otherwise, I’m not so sure everyone “knows” about the wide variety of kosher wines available. One would have to not only “know” about this fact, but would also have to “know” about the concept of a wide variety of wines in general. One would also need access to a good store that actually stocks a variety of good quality kosher wines that sell often enough to prevent the stock from aging poorly.
Having said that, it was a pleasure to direct a few fellow shoppers at an excellent local store toward some of nice kosher table wines available at reasonable prices. Besides, ever since I discovered that the concentrated sulfites in heavy sweet wines (and grape juices) cause - well, really bad things to happen to me - it’s been a requirement to migrate toward the slightly sweet and dry wines for our table. The Dalton Canaan white blend was very nice indeed!
Good kosher wines - can a visit from Eliahu haNavi be far behind?
I almost feel guilty having a few bottles of really nice west coast “yayin stam” in the rack. Almost.
BS”D
My peeve is that the articles sometimes come out with recommendations, but they rarely are run more than a week before Pesach. Assuming truly interesting wine suggestions by the publication, one would like to have the opportunity to purchase a bottle or 2. It would be nice, therefore, for such informative articles to be published at lest 2 weeks, and preferably 4 weeks ahead of Pesach. That minimizes last-minute scrambling to find interesting wines, which may not be availble in the immediate vicinity, or may be in short supply.
Craig
Hi,
I own a wine shop in Beacon Hill - and I’m guilty as charged. I do a weekly newsletter via email - and I don’t usually focus on the kosher wines much more before Passover. I’m sorry!! We have some kosher wines in stock regularly - but because we’re a specialty type wine shop - we’re able to special order most things and get them within a day. So keep that in mind as you find new kosher wines that you like - we can most likely get them for you if it’s not something already in the store.
Cheers!