Natural Alchemy: Crafting Kosher Wine Without Compromise

Episode Transcript
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S. Simon Jacob (00:09):
Welcome to the Kosher Teruah.
I'm Simon Jacob, your host forthis episode from Jerusalem.
Before we get started, I askthat, wherever you are, please
take a moment and pray for thesafety of our soldiers and the
safe return of all of ourhostages.
Welcome back to the KosherTerroir, where tradition meets

(00:33):
terroir and every bottle tells astory.
Today, we are diving into avineyard that's rewriting the
rules of kosher winemaking witha pure natural touch.
Meet Betachia Winery, whereancient craft meets modern wine.
Nestled in the heart of Israel'sElla Valley, this boutique

(00:53):
winery handcrafts high-quality,additive-free wines using
hand-picked grapes and zeropreservatives.
Led by a young, visionary duoof Jakob Singer, the CEO, and
Petachia Wittenstein, thepassionate winemaker behind the
bottle, petachia Winery is allabout authenticity,

(01:16):
sustainability and soul.
From the cotton paper labels tozero plastics, every detail
reflects a deep respect for theland.
So pour yourself a glass ofwonderful kosher wine and let's
swirl, sip and savor the storyof Petahia Winery right here on
the Kosher Terroir.
Welcome to the Kosher Terroir.

(01:37):
Thank you for having us.
It's a pleasure having you inthe studio.
It's wonderful.
So I have with me here YaakovSinger, shalom, and I have
Petahia Wittenstein, whorepresents Petahia Winery.
So, baruch Hashem, welcome,welcome, thank you.

Petachya Witenstein (01:56):
Thank you for having us.

I was quite surprised to taste a bottle of
Petahia and I was really kind ofblown away by it, so we'll
discuss it a little bit, butwelcome.

Yaacov Singer (02:11):
Thank you First of all.
I could say it on public recordnow it is amazing to be in your
house.
It's a beautiful house.
Well, I first just wanted tostart off with a surprise,
because Patakia has been tellingme the whole way here it's my
birthday today.
Yeah, and I have to play itLike I don't know.
I didn't know about it.
I said, no way, it's yourbirthday.
That's so cool, but really Ibrought a present.

(02:32):
No, no way.
And I wanted to bring it herebecause I said you know, it's
your birthday, wow.

We're big night, so I brought something he would
enjoy.
Wow, you can edit this out, nomore let it some air.

No, I think that's cool.
Yeah, no way wow, oh wow.

Your favorite nuts.
That's to the best winemaker inthe world and the best
brother-in-law.
Yes, by the way, brother-in-law.

wow, yes, that's cool.
This is, this is for all tohave these are salted almonds,
salted cashews dried mangoes.

I'm a crazy cashew lover, oh good, but you
know, what I do normally is Ifreeze them.
Really, I put them in thefreezer.
If you ever want to havecashews that are really crazy,
just leave them in the freezer.
You pop them out.
It's an incredible snack.

Definitely going to try that, okay, yeah,
it's cool.
Thank you for the surprise Wow.

It's a big day.

Cool.
How old are you?
Do you mind me asking?

No, okay, 32.
Younger than ever Wow, yes, 32years young, wow, yes, 32 years
young, wow, and you live inBechemesh.
Yes, both in Bechemesh, not toofar away from each other.
Okay, thank you, no problem,and yeah, our wives are sisters,
cool.

And your wives are from where Israel.

Originally South Africa.
Oh, south Africa.
Yeah, but they both were bornand grew up here.
The parents are from SouthAfrica, okay, cool.

Very cool, so you're originally from.

I grew up, born and grew up over here.
My parents are from the States.

Okay, and that's Betachia, and.

Yaakov, I'm originally from Lakewood.
Okay, wow, you heard of it.

Yeah, I did.
I used to live pretty close by.
I used to live in New Jersey.
I'm a little town called WestOrange, so does being in Israel
ever get old to you?

No, no, not at all.

Isn't it the greatest thing on earth?
Greatest it's like,unbelievable.
There's no better place toraise your children than here in
Israel.

I 100% agree.
It's like crazy I couldn't moveback to America.
I love visiting America, butliving I can't see myself living
there.

Yeah, it's kind of crazy.
How did you guys get interestedat all in wine?

Okay.
So a few years ago there was afew stuff that caused me to
start making wine.
One thing was also a little bitof a halakhic thing, which was
I wanted to create wine whichwould be perfect from a halakhic
point of view, which means notcooked, no additives, which
sulfite actually is consideredone of the additives, which is

(05:30):
not royal agave misbech, andthat was one reason how I
started making it.
Another reason is also becauseI realized that I buy a bottle
every week.
I'm very creative, baruchHashem, I mean, I do different
stuff.
I'm like why buy wine if I canmake my own?
So I figured you know how hardcould it be?

(05:50):
The first year wasn't too great.
Also, the second year wasn't,but the first year someone said,
okay, maybe you should learnhow to make wine.
But then eventually I wasgetting better at it and people
started liking it.
So did you have a?

mentor.
Did you have somebody that youwent to to learn how to make
wine, or you just researched ityourself?

So a lot of it was research, a lot of it
was experience, just issues thatI came up with as I was making
the wine and since Baruch Hashem, I'm sensitive to different
small details.
I was able to notice differentissues coming up and realizing
the issue and looking forsolutions, and that's how the
wine was perfected.
Give me an example, what sortof things?

(06:32):
Okay, so one of the big issueswith natural fermentation,
spontaneous fermentation, isthat it could be stuck and then
you have other stuff growingright is that?
It could be stuck and then youhave other stuff growing right
and, as you mentioned, which issomething which I've heard in
other places also, in a lot ofwineries, once they have
commercial yeast, theneverything is contaminated.

(06:52):
Yeah, so we have a bag ofcommercial yeast which we don't
use.
It's just there to save if wesee something stuck which we
actually don't use it.
But in order to prevent thisissue of having a stuck
fermentation, having other stuffgrowing and evolving before we
want the fermentation to start,I actually create a starter from

(07:14):
natural fermentation.
So the tests I do beforehandthat when I go to the vineyard
and I'm taking samples andchecking the sugar and seeing
how stuff are tasting andlooking.
I let it sit and ferment indifferent small batches and I'm
able actually to see.
I see one of them evolved intoa much nicer smell.
Good smelling tastes good and Iuse that for my starter.
So it's still naturalfermentation.

Yeah, but it's not.
It's a natural fermentation ofyour selected yeast.

But it's the same vineyard.

Okay, no, that's great, I'm not, I'm not, I'm
not.
It's an interesting way aroundthat it's an interesting way
around it, which is exactly whatother people would do if they
had the patience to do that.
They choose to take.
You know, buy commercial yeasts.
I mean, many of the winemakersexperiment with yeast all the
time.
They're constantly.

(08:11):
It's funny.
I found that many of thewinemakers started out making
bread and pastries and stufflike that and then they went
into wine and they said younotice a path, you're a yeast
addict, you just like yeast, andthat's what you're working with
.

Yeah, I never went the other way around,
because I've made lechemachmetzet from our yeast of the
wine.
Yeah, using that to fermentIsn't that great?

Oh, it tastes delicious and it's beautiful.

Well, it depends what sort of wine you're
using, but if you're using redwines, it's a beautiful pinkish
color and it's just once it wasstarted, once the yeast were
taking over the flour, it wouldjust continue adding flour and
the thing was alive and we had afew beds from it yeah and no.

It's amazing, it's absolutely amazing yeast is
an amazing thing I mean it's,it's this live vehicle that does
everything.
So right.

I like describing how they have the
natural fermentation.
I guess maybe we have a debateif you're considering this
spontaneous fermentation.
No, it's not spontaneous, it'sokay.

But go ahead.

Okay, when there's this in the wild yeast
even though I don't know I'm notable to control a specific
strain of yeast, obviously,because there's probably
millions of them, yeah, ofdifferent strains, even though
they might be off in the samefamily pretty much, except in
the bad ones.
But when you have thisfermentation going on, I like
looking at it as this big battle, like this war battle.

(09:37):
So there's different units,different types of soldiers and
everyone's doing their thing,types of soldiers and everyone's
doing their thing.
Some of them are going to takeover the battle in the beginning
and they're going to bedominant and start eating all
the sugars and sometimes also,kind of ballistic, eating all
the yeast, and then eventuallysomething's going to cause them
to die out and there'll be someother strain taking over them.

(09:58):
Now, the commercial yeast, fromwhat I researched, a lot of them
are just so strong and dominant, especially putting a lot in at
one time.
It's A lot of them are justthey're so strong and dominant,
especially putting a lot in atone time just going to take over
the party, especially if youstarted out with killing all the
wild yeast with sulfite ormaybe cooking whatever it is.
So, having this whole battlehappening together a lot of

(10:18):
these yeasts when they get tothe end line, which is the end
product, the wine.
So some of them are givingdifferent aromas which you would
not be able to get with thecommercial yeast, because it
doesn't exist in the commercialyeast it's its own strain, its
own family, not really its ownfamily, but its own thing
affecting it.

The reason they use commercial yeast is control.
I mean, that's what they'retrying to do.
They're trying to control it.
You're a risky guy, okay.

But I'm just telling you I can attest to it,
okay.

And we're talking, the winemaker here is
Patakia, so that's the one who'stalking the most in the
conversation, at least at themoment.
But so I get it, at least atthe moment, but so I get it.
You know, what you're doing isfinding ways to make the variety
of yeast number one from anatural source that you're

(11:13):
seeing and then being able tocontrol it so that that yeast
strain wins out, or the yeaststrain you want wins out over
the other strains that are there.
Because that's the reason why,once you use a yeast in a winery
, it's very hard to say I'mgoing to use wild yeasts,

(11:35):
because these strains, just onceyou develop them to be stronger
, just kind of take over.
Yeah, and you can't get them outthere and everything that's.

You're talking about the risk.
So I just, uh, I don't want tosound too radical, but I'll try
being being natural about it.
I, I've been thinking about it.
When I went into the hole intomaking wine, you know, it was
been saying it's such a big risk, and I I get it.
I understand why people aresaying it's a big risk, but I'm
but one question keeps on comingup to me is the whole ancient

(12:06):
world made wine like this?
Now some people will claim andsay their wine wasn't so great.
Okay, I think that it's hard toprove, first of all.
Second of all is that theancient wine industry was a
massive part of the industry, soit's hard to say that it was
just like something like peopleforced down their throats,
especially if it was coming fromYavne, which they just recently

(12:28):
found that they were producingmillions of bottles of wine In
Yavne, in Yavne, israel was oneof the biggest distributing
countries.

Yeah, I wonder how their systems worked, what
their process was like.

A lot of manual effort.

A lot of manual effort.
Yes, a lot of manual effort,but it was.

There was also a lot of, you know, variability
in it.
Um, we're getting very crazyabout trying to make consistent
wine every year and we want itto taste a certain way and we
want to taste it the way it usedto taste.
It tasted when we made it lastyear.

When we're talking about consistency of the
product, we're not trying to beconsistent.
We're creating, we're lettingthe wine, we're letting the
grapes pronounce themselves, anda lot of our work is really
preventing stuff that could ruinthem If it's temperature, if
it's us like, for example, thewhole process of making the wine

(13:28):
, every time you come into thewinery with gloves and masks
which I don't know any otherwinery who do that and that's
because preventing minimal nothaving any spit and any other
bacterias coming in.
So stuff like that which iskeeping it clean, sterile,
chitur and different stuff we'redoing to make sure that we're
not having other interferencethat could ruin this wine.

(13:49):
But again, going back to thepoint of how they made wine in
the ancient times, I always havethe question how did they
manage making?
It must have been an industrythat was worthwhile because
everyone was doing it, soobviously it wasn't going bad as
much as people today fear thatit might.
Because everyone was doing it.
So obviously it wasn't goingbad as much as people today are
feared that it might go bad.
And they were managed to do it.
So there should be some systemand I believe that we're not

(14:12):
experienced enough yet becausewe have other solutions that we
don't have to get to thatexperience.
So we're just going around it.
And I want to suggest somethingeven a bit.
Even more extreme is that Ithink that a lot of wine, you
have this amazing vineyard,unbelievable terroir, so we have
this amazing land, temperature,climate and someone making the

(14:34):
wine Everything's amazing.
But then, after you made thisunbelievable wine, you have to
sell it because someone has toeat at the end of the day.
Even with all of our love forwine, we also want to make a
profit from it.
So they take this amazingproduct and technically they
have to do a process a littlebit of ruining it, hoping you're
not going to ruin it too muchand still continue having this

(14:55):
unbelievable product with thispreventing it from going bad,
giving you longer life on theshelf, and hoping your wine
still stays good.
In other words, obviously todaywe were able to control it and
there's lots of differentmethods to make sure the wine
still comes out good.
But I think that pretty mucheveryone would agree that if you

(15:15):
were able not to put in anyadditives, you wouldn't do it.
There isn't any reason to addsomething which really doesn't
add to the wine.
At the worst case it's ruiningsomething if you're lucky and
you know what you're doing, soit's you're not ruining it, but
it's also it's definitely notadding anything.
Okay, there could be a littlebit of argument on that point.
No, I'm, I hear you so.

(15:37):
So that was.
So, again, looking at risk, ourkhazan, like our vision of what
we're trying to do is figure out, you know, sort of cracking the
system of how to create naturalwine with I don't know.
I'm not going to get into whenI say minimal intervention.
Yeah, so I'm not.

(15:57):
I'm not getting into the whole,like the what, like the
different laws and the differenthow people are going to
describe it exactly, but I'msaying giving this grape,
letting it pronounce itself andmoving away all the stuff that
could ruin this wine, which isalso one of the reasons why we
haven't done wood.
We haven't used oak, also forthis reason, because I believe
that oak, even with thecomplexity that adds, I feel

(16:20):
that that's also an additive.
It's an external additive whichis fine if people enjoy it.
But if we're trying to capturethe pure taste of the grape,
then adding other stuff, I'mconsidering it in a certain
sense, additives.

So you use amphoras, you use clay or
concrete.
Right Ceramic, okay ceramic.

Yeah, so this year was very exciting
because, uh, we actually builtour ceramic vats.
Okay, so we have this giganticceramic.
Uh, that's the concrete andoutside and ceramic and inside.
Okay, um, and yeah, and glassand we're we're gonna move to.
When we grow a little bit more.
We'll get either also concreteand also amphoras, amphoras,

(17:07):
amphoras.
I've actually experimented inwild clay, in clay from the
mountains Right, and createddifferent vessels from it.
It's a little bit complicatedbecause they leak.

You know, people don't realize how many
variables impact wine.
It's just crazy.
That's my favorite part aboutwine.
It's just crazy.

That's my favorite part about wine is
every little nuance affects thewine.
It gives it a different flavor.

You've got an interesting thought, though that
all of the things people do tocontrol the fermentation gets
away from just naturally lettingit do what it wants, as much as
you're trying to be pure andthis, and that you end up having

(17:56):
to deal with what the grapesthrow at you and what the
weather throws at you and whatKadesh Baruch Hu throws at you.
So that's, you know that's partof it.

You know that's one of the very fun processes.
I'm not as creative and intouch with nature as Patakia,
but one of the things that is alot of fun being in the winery
is is all these things that comeup during the the winemaking
process that I'm.
I like follow rules.
Like I asked Patakia, like whatshould I do now?

(18:25):
Like okay, do this, okay, I'lldo that and put the wine here,
put the grapes here, do this, dothat.
And when things like startgoing a different way, like I
get stuck, like what should I do?
And that's like where Pataki isat his best.
You know just feeling out thesituation, coming up with
solutions.
You know doing things with thewine and coming up with creative

(18:46):
ideas.
And yeah, that kind of bringsthe wine.
We have like probably 30different wines in our, in our
winery actually from thesethings like let's take the peels
from here and the stems fromhere, mix it with this water,
and he just has like 30experiments like all yeah around
, just thing, yeah that's thefun part.

That's how you know not a lot of people are, um
are able to experiment likethat.
So you're in, you're in a veryspecial position to do that, um.
So tell me a little bit aboutwhat you're doing.
I was surprised, when I tastedthe wine that was given to me,

(19:32):
that it was an Argumon.
That's a crazy grape, I mean.
I have tasted some fantasticArgumons, but I also know it's
difficult and I was impressedwith how good it was.
So that's one of the thingsthat surprised me, yeah.

Yeah.

Clapping is in order.
It is no, that's good.

Yes.

Yeah, I can't even do that.

So this vineyard, this, is more
sophisticated than I thoughtTell me about what?
Yeah, so this vineyard, this ismore sophisticated than I
thought Tell me

about what yeah where is this vineyard.

So this vineyard is right outside of
Zagim, you know Zagim.
Zagim is a Kfar Noah.
Okay, kids and Risk.
Yeah, my brother.
He used to be an Av Bayit.
Now he's sort of in charge overthere for different stuff.
It's not a Haredit place, bythe way, and so I was exposed to

(20:29):
that area.
It's.
It's Shvelat Yehuda, which isalso an ancient grape area also,
and this vineyard originallywas planted I don't know who
planted it, but it's about itshould be close to 20 years at
least and Zahim, this Kfar Noor,used to take care of it,
sometimes better, sometimes itwasn't.

(20:51):
I don't know if it wasspecifically their
responsibility, but sometimes itwas not really taken care of so
well.
And when we took them withgrapes the first time, which was
two years ago, last year, thething was pretty much abandoned
and it still made great, thisAgamon, I feel like it's like,
even though it was developedhere and it found its home, it

(21:14):
was born here but it wants tostay here and it just developed
so nicely and it's really rootednicely and it fits, even though
it comes off a little bit as aheavy wine because of deep color
, but it has something verypleasant and not so heavy, fit
and um, and I feel like it wasjust uh, when I from the second

(21:36):
I saw it and tasted it, I waslike this is my grape, like I
love this grape, yeah it's onlyreally really recent, recent,
that people have started to makethat really really recent.

You know, it is really really recent to me
because I'm over 70.
Actually, probably the firstwho made an Argoman that was its
own varietal, meaning that hemade wine out of Argoman
directly, not blended was AviFeldstein.
Avi Feldstein and he you knowpeople looked at him like are

(22:21):
you crazy?
And he made a great wine andthe trick is to do it
consistently.
So you've got your hands fulltrying to keep that going.

I can attest that it's been at least three years
now in the making.
It's been fantastic Deliciouswines.

Yeah, the vineyard has its charm.
We've been through it with hardtimes and good times, so we
actually have a nice story thisright now in the world, when
we're picking, we do picking byhand, even though a machine
could pick over there, but we dopicking by hand and we're
getting phone calls from ourwives, there's a missile coming

(22:58):
from the hoolies and we're lyingdown in the vineyard and over
us is these big booms Like wow,this is like.
This is Eretz.
Yisrael Nick needs to beassumed.
We're here, we're here to stay.
We're lying in the vineyard onthe ground.
It was like the mostunbelievable feeling.

I think that goes into terroir.
Yeah, definitely.

Sure, a hundred percent.
I agree with you.
They only shoot iron dome toprotect areas with populations.
So if it's an open shetach, youknow an open field.
Open fields are all vineyards,so you know.
Anytime somebody says, oh don'tworry, you know it landed in an

(23:41):
open field.

Oh God, which vineyard did that land in?
So that's that's the problemthat's why I got so nervous in
this field, because we're in theopen field, this is where they
let it drop yeah, this isexactly where they let them drop
, so yeah, it's, it's been, it'sbeen a challenge.

It's been a challenge and the best thing to
do is lay flat on the ground soyou don't get any shrapnel.
But it is crazy, and I've seensome vineyards up north where
there's sections of them justgone because of missiles, so

(24:18):
it's been a tough couple yearsnow.
So you're in this vineyard.
It grows.

What varietals are in the vineyard.
This vineyard itself is Argaman, it's about.
I think it's about 30 dunam.
The whole thing is 30 dunam, butthat first part is Argaman.
The second part, there's theone next to it which is not
Argaman.
It could be it's a muslin, I'mnot sure Some white grape at the
end of it.
Across from it, we have wherewe got our cabernet and where

(24:51):
they're all from, okay, and thenwe have Shiraz, which is also.
It's all pretty much in thesame sort of valley, yeah, yeah.
So that's all very muchEmaka'ela.

That's such a beautiful place, Emaka'ela.
It's just an incredible area.

Yes, I heard that this vineyard was
pretty much abandoned and Icould get from it.
So I went and I got from thereand then we decided to make them
.
But the grapes were just, andthere's always the argument if
only good grapes can make goodwine.
But in this case we didn't needthe argument because it was
just great grapes the color andthe taste and the aromas and

(25:30):
they were just delicious, justas they were, Even though this
vineyard itself is not soconsistent.
Some grow much bigger fruit andsome grow it's almost like I've
been trying to track them.
Who planted it?
To find out if this was one ofthe experimental vineyards they
planted.
So in this vineyard it was likeeven more extreme it could be

(25:50):
this is more common, but likesome parts of it where the sugar
was like 14 and some was like32 and we had to in order to get
a good balance.
I was going all over thevineyard to get a good balance.
I was going all over thevineyard to get the samples to
see exactly what area we need topick.

You really need to segment it and then go
through it, and that's the onlyway you'll know, year after year
, how it does, because there'sso many things, what's under
those vines, and there's a lotof rocky areas, and some of them
actually cause the vines tostress, which actually makes the

(26:36):
grapes better.
So it's really kind of crazy.

Again another human-like phenomenon in grapes.
That's stress.
Good stress, Stress makespeople bad.

Well, that's the whole thing with Kadesh Barhu
and us.
You know we're supposed to belike you take silver and you
refine it Right, and then itgives off some stuff.
You take silver and you refineit Right, and then it gives off
some stuff, and then the moreyou refine it, the more you
absolutely stress it out, burnit and what have you.

(27:11):
That's how you end up gettingthe finest silver.

Yeah, I heard a nice idea about this
from some guy called Malachi.
He's in Zaharim, so he saidthat when we prune, we call it
Zmirah.
Right, yeah, he said it's afunny thing calling it Zmirah,
which sounds like music, andwhat you're doing is you're
chopping off the plant.
It seems like you're ruining it, he said.
But the truth is, the musicwithout the beat, without the

(27:36):
cutting of the tunes, won't bemusic.
What creates the music is thefact that you have the stoppings
in the middle.
So when you take this vine andyou're cutting it, you're
calling it Zimila, becauseyou're actually doing what music
does.
That's what's going to createthis better thing is, by cutting
up these, making a cut up.

It's very true.
It's basically, instead ofhaving noise, you're improving
it, and that's what we'resupposed to do with everything
in the world.
The difference between us andthe Buddhists?
The Buddhists are supposed togo through life and not even
leave footprints.
If they could walk through thesand and not leave footprints,

(28:19):
that's exactly what they ideallywant to do, and with us, it's
exactly the opposite.
If you've walked through lifeand you haven't even left
footprints, you've wasted yourlife.
God put us here to improveeverything, so it's really
special.
So what are we going to taste?
Let's taste something.

This is my favorite time.
Okay, so this kanyan is from avery, very special vineyard.
Let's taste something.
This is my favorite time.

Go for it carignan maybe okay, so this
carignan is from a very, veryspecial vineyard.
Okay, I started telling youbefore there's a very nice story
about it.

Oh, you want to start with the carignan first.
What?

let me ask you a question let me ask you a
question.

Yes, you don't make any whites do you?

so this we actually.
I wasn't able to get whitegrapes like the ones we wanted
to get, yeah, but there was.
This is the surprise wine andI'm letting you know.
This is like for, just becauseI know you appreciate
interesting, you know,out-of-the-box style wines, yep,
or at least to put it on yourportfolio that you tasted this
wine, yeah, so it's actuallymade from edible grapes what's

(29:18):
called edible grapes.
You want to try the white first?
Yeah, yeah, from edible grapeswhat's called edible grapes.
You want to?

try the white first.

Yeah, the white is.
Let's just say it's sort ofexperimental.
I brought it here just forpeople who appreciate wine, okay
, but it's yeah crimson, yeah,crimson.
You've heard the grapes, no,okay, let's see how we finished
the harvest of the.

(29:44):
What was it?
The Shiraz or the?
yeah, either the Shiraz or theCabernet we're sitting there,
it's dark outside, it's gettingdark.
I have my flashlight on andthere's another vineyard of
fruit which they finishedpicking already and whatever's
left.
The guy told me, just pick.
So I'm like, okay, I'll takesome for my kids to eat and I'm

(30:06):
smelling these grapes and theysmell so delicious and so
aromatic and just very unique.
It's actually more.
It looks more like a rosé,you'll see.

I just want you to look at the bottle for a
second just to appreciatesomething.
Wow, that looks fantastic,Crazy.
Just look at the actual label.
Look where it says Crimson Ilove these.
Patakhi wrote that that'shandwritten.

Because we don't have labels for it.
So I figured let's make it nice.

That's crazy.
That's Sophorus and also theCarnion.
I just saw this for the firsttime.

It's got to keep it interesting.
You know it's part of thecreativity.
You know, Creating wine is morethan just making the wine it's
creating its environment.
It is yeah.

Wow, the color is beautiful.

Okay now, if anyone is not, this is not
anyone's palate, so feel free, Iwon't get insulted.
We'll try it.
We'll try it.
L'chaim Toby Mishal, l'chaim,l'chaim, this smells like I
would wear this as a perfume.

This is the color of, of what do you think?
Candy?
Yeah, it's like a candy color,it's.
It's not really a white, it's.

it's like a rosé, but it's not like a rosé
that I've ever yeah, because thegrapes are sort of off, sort of
this color just in the grape.
They're not red but they're notwhite.
There's some type ofcombination.

I can't believe this is what it tastes like now
yeah, I tasted this a few monthsago it was like a watered down,
just completely out of balance.
I actually cooled this off alittle bit.
It would be great if it was alittle chilled yeah.

So this is actually, as we said, a crimson.
I don't know if you ever tastedthat.
No, that's what they call agrape.
Yeah, it's actually sold as aJust a table grape A nafmachal,
a table grape.
Yeah.
So this again is part of alittle bit of being a little bit
naughty.
Breaking the Breaking the rulesyeah, because I feel like we're
creating, we're making newstuff, so why not experiment and

(32:26):
see what can happen?
Cool.

Change the cork.
What's?

your thoughts on the wine.
It's really interesting, it'snot.
That sounds bad.
I don't mean to be bad, it is.

It'll open up a little more.
Yeah, it's taking a.

It's going to take a little bit of time.
I've never tasted anything likeit.

Yeah, me too.
Listen, it's part of trainingour palates, and I don't mean
that in a bad way.

No, I don't mean that in a bad way.
I've never tasted anything likeit.
But I never tasted anythinglike orange wines either, until
I tasted them and I said this isnot for me.
This is more, you know, closerto something that I would like
to drink than an orange wine,but I've become very I'm a big

(33:31):
fan of orange wines now, so I'llkeep it closed and you'll chill
it a little bit more afterwardsand taste it again if you'd
like Okay, this is for theTaranian Yep.

So the story?
Should I tell the story aboutit?
Yeah, please.
So this person he's older.
Right now he's probably aroundeight years old or so Yep, he
has.
He got a few plots from Rav Kanain Moshe, bet Meir, this

(34:04):
yeshiva originally, when itopened up, was actually it's a
Haredi yeshiva which wasoriginally opened up as sort of
what you would call today TarvaAvarda.
They actually worked the fields.
Rav Kana's father was.
He was part of the guys fromthe Ymir yeshiva who came from
Shanghai and eventually thegovernment were looking for

(34:24):
people to populate differentareas in Israel, so they gave
him this big piece of land inMoshe to open his Yishiva.
So this person planted overthere two small vineyards and he
has a little winery there.
Until today he comes everyMonday to there, he does his
stuff in his pace.
He has this little little roomhe's, he does this thing.

(34:45):
And the way he started makingwine was actually when he was
getting close to you, this guy,in Russia, and there wasn't any
way to get any wine and anyonewas looking for getting to get
wine.
So this, I heard this story.
I'm not I don't know abouthistoric details, but whoever
would look to get wine, the theKGB would look for him and know
that he's looking for Jewish.
I guess they knew where totrack someone who was Jewish and

(35:07):
looking for wine, right?
So eventually he got a hold ofa grapevine and he planted it
outside his window and trainedit into his window and he
literally made wine for Kiddushfrom his window.
That was his first vine that heplanted.

I just want to say it.
I feel like I'm listening tothe podcast itself and enjoying
wine at the same time.
I feel like I'm drinking winelistening to a wine podcast.

Does it taste so different than when you
tasted it?

last, doesn't it?
I don't know, maybe it needs toopen a bit.
I don't know.

I didn't taste it yet I just want to say
it's fantastic listening to apodcast with you talking to
Simon, I would listen to thispodcast.

It's fun.

So this carignan is about 30 years old.
Yep, the vine In a very uniquespot.
It's like the corner, the tophighest part in Bet Meir,
looking over to the, to theocean pretty much, and this
vineyard I started because ofteaching yeshiva there.
I this year got a hold of it, Igot in charge of it and we're

(36:17):
starting really starting to tore revive it because it's not.
It's getting a little bit old,but it didn't give so much fruit
this year.
We had like maybe 30 kilos.
It used to give about 300.

This year, for some reason, a lot of the vines
gave very small amounts.
There was a definite decreasein yield.
I don't know why exactly therewas a definite decrease in yield
.
I don't know why exactly, butyou said that this is wine and

(36:51):
people and what have you.
The country is like afterOctober 7th is really hurting.
The harvests were done beforethat, the year after which is

(37:14):
2023, or 2023, I guess, or 2024,2024.
Yeah, 2024.
The harvest was like almost sad.
It just was not giving the sameamount of fruit as it had.
Not that it was suddenly, youknow, it's just the mood that
it's in at the moment.

(37:35):
That's interesting, and it wasacross many, many winemakers
that I spoke to said that Alsojust the fields were not kept up
like they usually are.

A lot of farmers didn't have staff to work the
fields.
Where we got from.
They said 80% of their crop isnon-existent.
This year they're only dealingwith 20%.

I actually spoke today to our guy from the
vineyard over there, yichiel.
Yeah, he got guys from Thailand.

Oh really.

Yeah, just now.
So they're doing, hopefully the.
He sounded very hopeful, whichis good, because last year was
tough.
It was yeah, you saw it on him.
Yeah, you saw it on him.
I was like these guys are likegrowing grapevines.
How could they be so tense?
Sorry for saying it.

No, it's true, it was very hard, it was because
between the bombs dropping andall the workers going into
Miloim I mean people were inMiloim for 200 days 300 days.
I mean it's crazy Our winegarden was also, and what are
your thoughts about this one?
This is not typical for me of aCarignan.
No A Carignan is usuallyextremely intensely tannin.

(38:50):
This has some tannins.
It has some acid as well, butit's much more fruity, um much
more fruity, yeah and uh, andit's also kind of candy-ish.

You know, there's like kind of a candy.
I'm trying to get that smell.
What is it?
Candy like toffee, maybe likesomething like caramel, maybe a
little bit burnt?
Yeah, has it gotten more fruityfrom the past.

I don't recall this, either right months ago,
yeah, yep, I don't know.
I didn't taste it originally,but the finish is is is quite
long okay so the thing that'scool is it's really nicely
balanced.
The front of the palate is nice, the mid palate is nice and

(39:40):
it's got a long finish as itgoes through, I'm still, I'm
still tasting it, yeah, and it'sum, which is, you know, really
nicely done it's also a naturalfermentation and uh.

No additives, also not cooked, no sulfites and
uh did you mention that youpruned these actual vines, that
you took care of these vines?
Yeah?

these vines are the ones I.
There's the only vine thatright now I'm pruning and taking
care of, dealing with the waterand the other stuff that
involved in it, so it's veryexciting so, as you see, the
more he's involved in the bottle, you see just the more flavors
there are.

It comes out with the human grape connection,
yakov is the marketer.

You're noticing that he does his work
amazing.
He really is.
Listen, artists, how do you say?
Artists starve right?

Yeah, I'm just taking his art.

I'm enjoying his art the way we
started it, because I wasn'tplanning to get into this thing
at all, because I was makingwine, enjoying it, lovely to
drink it, giving to everyone,throwing parties.
And he and me we were flyingtogether in England to England,
the whole family, for oursister-in-law's bar mitzvah,
son's bar mitzvah, and on theplane he's like listen, you got

(41:08):
to sell your wine.
I'm an artist, I make the stuff.

Going to my perspective to cut you off for a
second, sorry.
He's been making wine now forfour years and he's my
brother-in-law, so we eat a lotof the same meals together At my
in-law's house.
We'll both be there for Shabbosand I'm the recipient of this
wine every week.

(41:35):
I'm just enjoying it.
I'm loving this wine and Inotice I can't get this wine
anywhere.
It's unique.
You're not finding this, likeyou said.
Noticed like I can't get thiswine anywhere.
It's it's unique.
You're not finding this, likeyou said, like you could tell a
castel.
You could tell, uh, you couldtell the patagia amazing.
And it's uh, yeah.
And eventually I said this thisgotta, this has to get out

(41:56):
there.
This wine has to get out there.
And what's interesting is isthat there's actually been a lot
of people who said the same,say the same sentence like, like
once they they're drinking this, it's like it's a whole nother
uh, a whole nother world in wine, like it's not.
So someone actually I don'tknow if this is a good thing or

(42:19):
a bad thing someone's like hetasted this.
He's like it doesn't taste likewine.
He's like it's missing the wine.
He's like it doesn't taste likewine.
He's like it's missing the winetaste.
I like that.
You're probably referring tothe wood flavor or sulfites,
whatever it might be, but it'sdefinitely it's a unique.

No, it's definitely.
I don't know what he meant bythat.
It's definitely wine.
I think it's not what he wasused to, I know.

I know it's not the characteristics.
Yeah.

One thing I like to do with people who are
not so experienced in lots ofwines but they try to describe
just in a practical way whereyou taste the sulfites is.
I say, take a wine you like theHans sulfites, the Fiat Tekken
and drink it together with winewithout, and you really get the
idea of where the sulfites arehitting you and the different

(43:10):
little bit of a metallic taste,slight metallic taste, which the
sulfites are adding.
Now, the better the wine is,they're able to.
I don't want to sound tooextreme and say to disguise it,
but it blends in and you don'ttaste it too much, which that's
obviously what we're trying todo.
I do have a theory that a lot ofwines are overwooded.
Yeah, because they put too muchsulfites, because they have to

(43:34):
protect the wine and the wood.
This is my palate's opinion, ifI can say it that way, the wood
is able to sort of disguise thesulfite, the off-taste of the
sulfite, which is why some ofthese wines they taste very
layered and very nice, butthere's something happening that
is like some type of a roughtaste or feeling maybe, and the

(43:58):
wood is sort of like disguisingit.

To have the wood express itself so much so that
you can taste the wood.
That's not the goal of makinggood wine, but you know there
are some wines that are likethat.

Yeah.

So yeah.

Would you like to ?
Should we open up the Argumano?

Yeah, let's go for it.

That would be crazy.
By the way, I'm just lettingyou know I could sit here all
night.
What time do we have to be out?

We're okay, we're good, yeah we're good,
we're good, we're good, we'regood.

The question is who's carrying us out?
No, it's okay, we're notdrinking that much.

No, no, no, we're used to these little
tastes.
Yeah, it's true for all wines.
People ask me shall I let itair out?
I say, just taste, open it,drink a little bit and taste it,
because I think every wine in acertain sense is alive.
But when there isn't somethingpreventing the aliveness which I

(44:58):
think it's a lot of thesulfates are doing that.
As you're drinking, you reallyfeel the process that's going
through and really taste theprocess that's going through,
because we manage the oxygen sowell.
Sometimes it's not even exposedenough to oxygen, right, but
when we're trying to describewhat oxygen does you spoke about
it a little bit before yeah, Ilike saying as, just to help

(45:18):
just understand it more is ifyou have this beautiful fruit
and it smells good and delicious, but when it's closed off,
there's no exposure to your noseor to open air, then you're not
able to get all the good aromasand flavors coming out of it,
right, right, if you take aknife and start chopping into it
, what you would do is you'reactually destroying the fruit by

(45:40):
chopping it, but you'reactually letting out the aromas
and flavors because that's whatyou're able to get.
Similar to that when the wineis getting oxidized.
Part of what's happening isthat the oxygen is ruining it,
but it's really taking it apart,breaking it down, and that
breaking down is what exposesthe smells and the aromas and
the flavors breaking out of it.

The Argaman is really pretty incredible in that
it has great tannins.
It's great, it's wonderful itis.
The finish is still going, butthe acid is more present, which

(46:22):
is good, and the tannins aremore present.
I really like this expressionof Argaman.

Yeah.

I was surprised.
I didn't think I would.
I really didn't think I would.
Why is that?
Because of its difficulty to….
Yeah, and also that you knowyou guys are new at it, and what
have you?
Thank you.
Somebody the person who showedit, you know, gave it to me,
promised, I think he promisedyou that he would share it with
me.
And he said, well, you know,like, okay, what do you think of

(46:51):
it?
And I said, and then I tastedit and I went it's not that bad,
this is pretty good.
And I was pretty surprised, sosurprised.

So, yeah, he's a good guy how would you rate this
on like a, a qualitative levellike?

I this expresses a lot of things that a number
of people would like.
There's some people who arehardcore French wine people who
will never go for this.
Okay.

They just won't.

Number one is because it's got like.
It's got a certain amount of Idon't want to call it roughness,
but because it's natural.
It has no preservatives,there's no sulfites, so it's got

(47:58):
this natural edginess to itthat normally is killed,
normally is beaten down, and Ikind of like it.
So I understand what you'retrying to accomplish with it and
I like it.
I would drink it.

(48:22):
It's interesting.
My wife has a much betterpalate than I do and she likes
it a lot.

We had it here, Really.
Yeah, I heard you had it a few,like it was a day after it was
open, a few days.
Yeah, that also surprised uswas the.
It surprised me was how long itlasts.

I find it lasts more than once with Sofit.
I can't explain it, it doesn'tmake sense.

I don't know.
It didn't last that long for mebecause we drank it.
We had a group of people andeverybody went oh, we've got to
taste that.
And it was gone.
So that was.

Actually, this Shabbos I poured myself a
cup of two different wine grapes, wines that I made right, and I
had this cup sitting and Itasted it Friday night and then
after the Sula I tasted a littlebit right before I went to
sleep.
I tasted a little bit moresitting on the table with the
napkin in it and then when thesiren went off on Friday night,

(49:25):
after everyone's back into bed,I go.
I go off and a half sleeping,tasting it, really seeing its
evolvement within 24 hours.
I finished it by Avdallah andit was like taking this journey,
this Shabbos allowed journey,with this cup of wine, these two
cups of wine.
It was really fantastic.

It's one of the most fun things to do.

The stamp at the top, at the top of the
way.
Yeah, it's actually carved outfrom a piece of olive wood is
really olive wood, if you like?
Wow, cuz we were here this,this, this part?

yeah, oh, you have that one, I got it.
I want to get one more wine foryou to taste.
Oh, you got one more.

We have a.

Cabernet.

You have a Cab.

We have a Cab.

Wow, this is a rollercoaster of a Cab,
okay, so usually we're able tomanage the mellow lactic
fermentation.

Yeah.

We've seemed to miss it with this cab,
which resulted with the secondfermentation after it was
bottled.

Okay, wow.

Yeah, Okay, so it complements it.
It actually, in my opinion,transforms definitely more
softer and nicer, like theMelodactyl often does, but we've
been having a little bit offizziness.
So it's not a pet nut, but it'sa little bit fizzy.
It's interesting.
Yeah, it's alive, exactly, it'ssomething which is just giving

(50:59):
its story and you could eitherbe part of the story or say this
is not for me, but there's astory going on.
I have four cups over here andI'm smelling every one as I'm.
They're all developing.
They're developing amazing.
I tasted before the Carnian.
I had a little bit of thatraisin-y smell at the beginning

(51:23):
and it sort of matured up.
Yeah, even though raisin issort of it blew off.

Yeah, no, but it blew off and just.

I think that, as we say, the party in
the nose, the different smellscoming out and going, jumping
from one smell to another.
And as much as I find a lot ofpeople are very developed on
their palate, I've been alwaysvery developed on my nose
smelling stuff and sensingdifferent stuff and I just find

(51:52):
it like, first of all, theliveliness everything's so alive
.
I'm just really enjoyingsmelling one by one, jumping
through them.
It's almost like hearing theirstory.
That could be poetic about it.
It's almost like hearing thisstory.

I could be poetic about it.
What's interesting to me is howmuch they open up.
I would have thought that wineswith sulfites would actually
open up a lot because they'remore contained and closed in.
It needs to aerate and all that, and I thought natural wines

(52:30):
would be more.
What you open is what you getfrom the beginning, but I was
shocked still how much itdevelops along the I'm still
like how much it develops alongthe.

I'll tell you why Because the sulfite actually
protects the wine fromoxidizing somewhat.
The natural wines don't havethat protection, so they might
actually develop more when youopen them up, but I don't know.

Interesting how are they for you?
How are they?
This is oh, is that the cab?
I'm very curious what your takeis on the cab.

It's unlike any cab I've tasted in the past
we've been getting that so muchI know in a good way.
Yeah, no, no, it's not a badthing, um it's.
It's just there is a problem.
Yeah, I'll tell you what theproblem is.

It's too good.

No, no, it's almost unfortunate to put labels
on these bottles, because whathappens is it's the same thing
that happened when I firsttasted orange wine.
When I first tasted orange wine, I said no thanks.
And I asked Yakovoria, why am Ireacting like that?

(54:16):
And he said because you'vedrunk a lot of wines.
You will find that the peoplewho are real wine drinkers,
drink a lot of wine, are notgoing to be so open to your
wines, because when you drink alot of wine, your brain creates

(54:38):
boxes and you put differentflavors and different tastes in
each of those boxes and whensomething doesn't fit in a box,
your automatic reaction is toreject it.
Okay, I'm sure people who arelike new wine drinkers taste
this stuff and go whoa, this isgreat.

(55:00):
You know, when I've tasted winein the past, it's been not for
me.
This tastes good.
I think that that's the reactionyou're going to get and I'd be
surprised if it isn't.
Why do you think that would be?
Because it's not like this cab.

(55:22):
It doesn't taste like a cab, itdoes taste like a cab.
After you think that would beBecause it's not like this cab.
It doesn't taste like a cab, itdoes taste like a cab after you
think about it, but yourinitial reaction is that it
doesn't taste like a cab andit's like oh, you know well,
this doesn't fit into the boxesthat I have prepared for tasting
this.
I'm just telling you what myopinion is.

Yeah.

I think that a lot of the when you're
saying it doesn't taste like acab, I feel like this is what
cab tastes like, if not for usinterrupting it with a lot of
other stuff.
In other words, if you, we'llkeep this, we'll leave this
bottle here for you.
Open another cab yes and tryseeing where, where they link

(56:07):
together, where they're the sameand where they're not right.
And I think, I think that we'vebeen getting a lot, of, a lot
of people like so this is so,this is cab.
Like what you're saying.
This is our malo, doesn't, youknow, taste so much finer than
I've ever tasted.
It's almost like it.
It's almost like I don't haveto force it down.
I don't mean it to sound in anegative way, but we've compared
our wines also to very I'm notgoing to say very expensive, but

(56:30):
nice for sure 200-bottle winesand again and again we're
getting something which is a bitmore pure.
Some people would consider it abit less body.
Although I have a little bit ofa debate, which I'm happy to
hear what you think about it, Ifeel like a lot of times people
are confusing a complexity andbody with the wood and a little

(56:52):
bit of a rough taste, a roughgoing down.
Sometimes people considersomething more sophisticated
when it's harder for them todrink If they have to force
themselves I'm not talking aboutexperienced wine drinkers, but
some people when they'redrinking something and they have
to force themselves not to makea face, then this must be good,
because everyone else says it'sgood, and now this is obviously
what's the right.

(57:13):
You know what I mean.

Okay, so one of the things that's special about
Israel is that the varietalsthat come from Israel, there's
some, there's some incrediblevarietals that were like argamon
you taste it, but there's onecalled tabuki, so there's him
dolly, there's another Jen dolly, and there's also him and dolly

(57:38):
as well, as well as oneChendali, chendali.
Yeah, there, most of the winesthat came out of Israel besides
Argaman, which was createdrecently, were wines that were
lighter and brighter and moredrinkable in a warm climate.

(58:03):
I mean, now we're warm climatehere.
Now, with air conditioning, isnot like the warm climate was a
hundred years ago, when therewasn't air conditioning.
When there's, when it's hotoutside, you could either drink

(58:25):
something that's a little bitlighter and fruitier or you can
drink a heavy cab.
What do you think people aregoing to drink?
They're not going to drink aheavy cab.
In the middle of winter you know, like last week here, this last
week here, which was the middleof winter, where the

(58:46):
temperature went down into the40s, yeah, cabs are great, but
when it goes up to the 80s bythe end of this week, the last
thing you want to start drinkingis a heavy, heavy wine.
So these are a little lighter.
A heavy wine, so these are alittle lighter.
Even this cab is a little bitlighter, but it's really lovely.

(59:12):
It's fruity, it's a lovely wine.

Thank you.

I think you're going to get a lot of takers,
takers, takers.

Takers.
Oh yeah, People are going towant to drink this wine.
I'm still curious why you thinkthat the first time drinkers
would like it over the meaning.
Why, if it's your first?

time Because I'm a cab lover.
Yeah, so when I drink, why, ifit's your first?
Because I'm a cab lover, yeah,so when I drink this, it's too
light, it's not.
It's not um the typical cab,heavy duty cab, super fruit
forward.
Um, this is fruity, but it'sit's lighter, I like it.

Yaacov Singer (01:00:07):
But people who are like starting out.
You're saying they don't have abox yet what they're expecting,
so it would.

S. Simon Jacob (01:00:15):
The people who are starting out.
A person would drink this andgo.
This isn't so tough to drink.
This is nice.
It's a pleasure, isn't that afunny?

statement I'm a pleasure.
Isn't that a funny statement?
Though I'm still trying.
Isn't it a funny statement?
Yes, it's a crazy statement.

But typically you'd buy a French wine, it
wouldn't be approachable for 20years.
You'd have to keep that wine inyour cellar and hope to God
that it would mature properly.
Okay, typically those Frenchwines are good for the first six
months a year, all right.
But they don't.

(01:00:49):
They're drinkable, but theydon't really show themselves.
Yet.
There's all sorts of extralevels of flavors and tertiary
flavors, and what have you like?
Chocolate and tobacco and allthe rest of these other things
that come At the beginning.
They don't have that, but atleast they're drinkable.
Then they go into what's calleda dumb phase and they shut down

(01:01:12):
.
And when you drink them, thenthey're nothing.
They're just nothing.
They're either acid, or theyjust really don't have a taste
acid, or they just really don'thave a taste.
There's tannins and stuff thatjust are not pleasant unless you
swirl them for hours and leavethem open for hours.

(01:01:33):
And what have you to try tocombat that?
But that doesn't bring out thetertiary flavors.
That just lowers the hurdle ofbeing able to get in and even
put it in your mouth and notspit it out.
And then after 20 years, 25years, it might have developed

(01:01:56):
these incredible tertiaryflavors with chocolate and this
and that and what have you.
And there's some wines thatI've tasted that are just
amazing like that.
But that's crazy.
Why should I buy something andhave to sit around for 20 years
before I can drink it?
And it's drinkable?

Petachya Witenstein (01:02:16):
I have a question for you about this
Anything.
Do you feel that or think thatthe view that a lot of wine
drinkers have is, if this wine,they look at a bottle and like,
oh, it's 2024.
Like they have expectationsthat a wine must be only good if
it's like from 2000 and beforethat, no?

it's ridiculous.

It's like French right.

No, some people have that attitude about it, but
the truth is that that's notthe way wine works at all I get
messages like that all the time.

They're like oh for a 2024.
Yeah, for 2024.

Yeah, but the problem that you have is the
older wine gets, it doesn't getany better, unless it's made to
get better, and most of the wineisn't.
So you can take a bottle ofBarkan and that's from 1998, and

(01:03:16):
it's.
You can open it up and it canbe absolute rubbish.
It's not about that.
It's about there's certainwines that can age and certain
wines that can't.
And if you've got a wine thatcan age, it's the same thing
with whites.
There are certain whites.
People realize that whitesdon't age.

(01:03:39):
Okay, most people feel that,like a rosé, you have to drink a
rosé within the year it wasmade.
After that it's not goodanymore.
Or if you drink a white wine,white wine might be good for two
years.
It's not good after that.
That's not true, it's.

(01:04:00):
It depends on the winemaker.
It depends on what he's made.
There's a wine by yakov oriathat's a 2009 uh, semi-on that
tastes fresh and delicious andwonderful.
They're italian wines that ifyou drink them the first year,
the first two years, they tastelike water, and it isn't until

(01:04:25):
two or three years into it thatall of a sudden, they've
developed other flavors andthey're amazing wines and you
know that's wine.
The other thing is that there'sno good wines or bad wines.
I mean there are, to be quitehonest, there really are.
I mean there are, to be quitehonest, there really are.
But overall it's not about whatsomebody else says, it's about

(01:04:47):
what you taste.
It's subjective.
There's no.
You know, it's like a scam thatpeople come back and say, oh,
this is like there are somewines that you'll taste, that
somebody will say to you like,as an example, some of the
French wines that are prettycrazy, that taste like graphite

(01:05:12):
or that taste like ink, thatdevelop into something that's
like really kind of special, but99% of the wines don't have
that sort of characteristic,characteristic or capability.

so I know people always they, and a lot of people
.
I'll give the wine to any wine.
You'll hear it a lot.
Yeah, they'll drink wine andthey're like, wow, like I really
enjoy this bottle, but hey, I'mno connoisseur, so, like, what
do I know?
You know what's good for you?
That's what the whole thing is.
You know, like, if you like itif you're enjoying it, enjoy it.

Go for it.
Guys, go for it.
There's a lot of wines that Idon't like, but I enjoy wines
that are interesting.
These are interesting wines, soI enjoy them.

I think it's very important that you're
saying this stuff, because Ifeel like a lot of the young
world, like we're surrounded alot with the younger guys, and a
lot of people are like theyhave like this fear of missing
out from the sophisticatedgeneration, who are drinking
what they believe in traditionand what they think is
considered a good wine, and,instead of enjoying the wine
they like, they're busy tryingto taste wines that people are

(01:06:33):
telling them that it's good andthey never develop enjoyment for
wine, even though they could,because they never experienced
something which is suitable forthem.

You know what I want some more of the Argoman.

I have the Saramashkin as well.

It comes with one of my favorite jobs.
This is the Argoman.

That's what you wanted, right.

I want the Argoman in this one and I want
the cab in this one.
Sure.

Thank you, jakob, you're getting it, I'm so
nervous every time.

Why I?
Just because you know I don'thave that muscle memory yet.

No, no, it's okay, it's okay.
I don't want to miss the, theedge of that, the widest part of
the mouth.

Yeah, there it is .
Which one would you like?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, just the cognac.
It's like this curious.
I'm so curious about it, Ican't figure it out.
Yet One second.

I feel like it's probably opened up.
When we were looking for a namefor our winery, we went through
every biblical term there was.
We searched everything that hasto do with wine.
It's all taken Choshen, theEifod, the Tabernacle.

Yeah, I just got to say, if you're ready
to bring this up, that it's abit weird for me to have the
name of the winery under my name.
Like I call up the guy dealingwith some part of the wine, so
he's like so, what winery areyou?
I'm like Yekev Tachia.
Okay, good, what's your name?
Tachia's like oh, it's that guywho called it on his name.
Listen, it wasn't my choice, Iwould give up the name.

(01:08:09):
You know the other people, thepeople who are doing the salad.

They said it's a good name, he started going by.

Masha I know, but it became too much,
it's so beautiful.
I appreciate it.
I like the name also.
But it was actually aninteresting story about that
because the top of the stamp, sowhen Annie designed this thing,
the stance, the top of it,right.
So this is a P, a P in ancientHebrew, but turns out that it

(01:08:41):
looks more like a J, like someinteresting J.
So it's like Hashem said it'sYaakov People called him J for
years.
So it's like JP.
Hashem put it in Mishamayim.
It's amazing, it's reallyamazing.
I guess we could also go for JP.
It also works.

I'm like the Pur, so I guess we could also go for
JP.
It also works.
I'm like the Purim story inthis wine.

You know you find me hidden in the bottle
, somewhere, hidden in thecellar somewhere drinking the
bottle.

That's me, I'm also there.

Another thing about the enjoyment of
making wine is there's nothingmore enjoyment when you come to
the wine and you taste wines.
We're not big spitters to saythe least.
Yeah, wine's meant for drinking, and we taste, and taste, and
taste.

Yeah, but you really learn a lot.
You start from when the wine'sjust developing and you really
learn a lot, like you start fromwhen the wine's like just
developing and you really followthe process.
It's so amazing to be therethrough the whole story.

It really is special to do that.
You know, I often tell peoplethey say you know like, when you
buy a bottle of wine, you know,like, how long should you wait
before you open it and what haveyou?
I never buy one bottle, Ialways buy at least two, and
what I do is I drink them atdifferent times.
As soon as I get a bottle, I'mhappy to open it.

(01:10:10):
I don't wait forever, unlessit's a crazy bottle that I know
is not going to be drinkable yet.
But I normally open it and Itaste it, and I taste it through
a period of time.
I taste it over a week, or whathave you.
And then a year later, whathave you?
I taste the second bottle, or,if I get a case, I'll drink them

(01:10:34):
periodically and because I liketo see how a wine develops over
a period of time, and that's,that's the interesting part
about it.
It's like if you only met a kidwhen they were two and they
were the cutest kids in theworld, it would be wonderful.

(01:10:54):
But unless you meet them laterand really see what the kid
turns into, you're really seeinga very stifled view of that kid
.

It's another human-grape connection.

It's totally Very interesting theory.
I want to ask you what youthink about it.
It's known that when the Gemaraspeaks about wine, they have to
dilute it.

Yeah.

And I was wondering, tell me if this makes
just a theoryara speaks aboutwine.
They had to dilute it, yeah,and I was wondering, tell me if
this makes just a theory I'mthrowing out.
I'm wondering let's say thatthere was a strain of yeast that
was strong enough to eat sugarsup to 30-40%.
So if you would have very sweetgrapes and the yeast would not
die out from their own alcoholenvironment, then theoretically

(01:11:45):
we should be able to have winecoming up to 30-40%, which is
pretty much like when you drinka scotch, which wouldn't be
possible to drink a cup ofKiddush or Four Kaisers without
diluting it.
That would be a niceexplanation for what they
experienced then, as wine wasn'table to drink, wasn't able to
drink without diluting it, andif that I mean it's a little bit

(01:12:07):
close in history to say thatsuch a strain of yeast was
distinct, instinct, extinct,extinct.
It's not so far away, but ifthat would be true, that would
be an interesting explanationfor that.
What do you think about it?
I think it's a cool explanation.

I always wondered, because the truth is
that I've never met, I've neverheard of a winemaker who made
wines that you needed to diluteamong the Sfardi Reveille, that
you needed to dilute among theSfardi Reveille they don't want

(01:12:47):
to drink.
They're very careful aboutwhich wines they drink, because
they want it to be fully wineand they don't want it to be
diluted wine.
That's the one that was evenmore strange to me, because I
said I've never seen any wineryput water into wine in order to
make it.
You know less Right.

In fact, the Pasek considers someone
who's a cheater Yep, the Paseksays yeah.
Your wine.
You're selling wine.
You're putting water in it.
That's like one of the examplesthat Pasek speaks about someone
who's cheating in business.
So it is an interesting thing,but with this theory it's just
interesting.
I don't know.

(01:13:31):
Your audience is probably verysmart people.
Maybe someone would have any.
It's not about being smart it'sabout.

there might be people who have more experience
in it, but I think there aredifferent theories.
Where would you like to be infive years?

So I don't know about five years, but our
vision for next year is we'regoing to do more than we did
this year and I'm specificallylooking to very excited actually
to experience in lots ofdifferent also experiments, but
also letting stuff develop.

(01:14:14):
And let's say, for example, ifwe have this Argamon, then I
want to make a Rosé from thesame Argamon and have someone
who enjoys the Argamon and alsoenjoys a good rosé, seeing what
he thinks about them together Idon't mean, it's going to be
interesting to make a rosé outof an Argaman.
Yeah, but Argaman itself as asingle varietal grape was also

(01:14:35):
interesting to make in the firstplace.

Right 100%.

I think that people are open, especially
a lot of the younger guys whoare not like don't.
I think that people are open,especially a lot of the younger
guys who are not, like you said,the boxers.
They're looking for something alittle bit different.
They're looking for somethingthat's going to, like you said,
it'll strike them, it'll tastegood.
It doesn't have to be the mostsophisticated, but it'll taste
good.
If it's a Argoman, if it's anover-red rosé, Because Argoman
is probably going to be anover-red rosé, like a much

(01:15:00):
deeper rosé, but it'll stillhave that lightish acidity, like
the liveliness that a roséwould have, and I think that
would be appealing to a lot ofpeople who are looking for
something a little bit different, specifically being natural
fermentation and no addedsulfites.
I think that would be a nice.
That's just one example we have.

(01:15:20):
What I would like to do is totry to get a hold of Originally
we thought about four, I don'tknow why we decided four.
We'll get four different typesof grapes every year and
experiment with them so we canactually see which grapes we
like the most and try workingnot only with what the market
likes, which that also we'll trydoing which is typically like
the Cabernet Merlot.

(01:15:42):
You sort of can't go wrong withit.
But we would like to try withlots of different types as much
as we could get our hands on.
And also it's important us, theyes be involved a certain
extent with the guy growing thegrapes, with the vineyards 100%.
And it's a big challengebecause they're very a lot of
these people are growing thegrapes, are looking for you not
to be in their business.

(01:16:02):
They don't want you messingwith them.
So it's a little bit of achallenge.
But I think we have some guysinside who are some guys working
for us right now and he'sinvolved in that area and we're
hoping, with Zadashan, to get ahold of different varietals and
different types.
It'll be good, zad Hashem, toget a hold of different
varietals and different uh,different types.

(01:16:23):
It'll be good, zad Hashem.

Yeah, just to add to that, he also wants, besides
for the Argaman and then theArgaman Rose, he's also going to
serve um sourdough bread madefrom the Argaman yeast.
Yeah, that'd be cool.

So you get like a full right and then we
have the meat.
If we ever do like a little bitof a, like a eating type of
barbecue right.
So the meat is gonna bemarinated with with the wine yep
.
The bread's gonna be fermentedwith the yeast from the wine yep
.
And the cow itself ate, youknow, the leftover of the grapes
.
And also, we actually havevinegar.

(01:17:02):
This is not a mistake vinegar.
We actually created vinegarfrom using the stems and we
actually had to add sugarbecause we wanted to get a
strong vinegar.
I have some at home.
I gave you a bottle of that.
It's the most delicious vinegar.

That's a hot thing Today.
It's even more than wine.
If you can make good vinegar,really delicious vinegar, that's
a hot thing Today.
It's even more than wine.
If you can make good vinegarReally, yes, that's a very hot
thing.
Chefs, all of these chefrestaurants are looking for
vinegar.

Yeah, okay.
So I'll tell you another coolthing about it.
We actually have some of itfermenting with this.
I'll use wood chips because I'mhappy with it.
So it's oak, but it's Israelioak I.
So it's oak, but it's Israelioak.
I chopped it down myself.
It's delicious.
I cooked it in the oven, Ibaked it to the right.
That's a very delicious nuttyflavors.
In fact, I was cooking in theoven and my wife walks in.

(01:17:51):
She's like are you makingcookies?
Like no, I'm cooking wood.
She's like she's used to mycrazy stuff.
She's like, oh, okay, and itsmelled delicious, right.
And that was it smelleddelicious right yeah, so we have
some of that.

Uh, actually use it every now and then.

Who's your customer base, our customer base
right now, my, the, my targetaudience is the american
community mostly.
Do you have an?
Ability to sell to america no,so not in the american community
here in in israel.
Okay, because that's just thepeople I know.
That's where I could spread theword, that's where I could Beit
.
Shemesh where?
So?
Mostly in Yerushalayim, andalso Beit Shemesh how about

(01:18:30):
Renanah?
So I haven't gone out there yet.
But what the American communitythere?

They have a British community Anglo.
Instead of saying AmericanAnglo, I would just go for Anglo
.
I guess that's more I'mAmerican side, yeah, or?

Foxton, yeah, but no, I see the world as you have
anyone who's not?

yeah sure the Cleveland the Rabbit was.
We used to be close to whoCleveland the Rabbit yeah, he's,
isn't.

That Tells no he's no.

Cleveland the Rabbit's an interesting guy,
yeah, but he has his bases inRenana.
Okay, he was a Holocaustsurvivor, I believe he didn't
have kids, but his stepson is arabbit right now.
Okay, very nice.

No, but there's a lot of Anglos in Renana,
Herzliya, Renana, what have you?
Yeah?

I would love to get out there Also.
The Israeli community?
I'm not, it's just, if I haveto take a starting point on
where to start with my sales,it's going to be who you know,
yeah, who I know, and yeah, orhave an easier time connecting
to.

So what's your volume like of what you produce
right now?

So this year we produced roughly 1,500 bottles
Okay For sale.

Yes, I get it.
You produce more than that, butyou're keeping some of them
back.

Right, not everything we're able to let out
in the market, for sure, notEven like right now we have with
the Cabernet, which started outamazing.
And then, surprise, surprise,natural fermentation, second
malolactic fermentation, whichwe were able to control I
thought I was under control onthat one, but we're learning,

(01:20:15):
yeah.
So not everything we're goingto release.
We want to release only highestquality and only stuff which we
think tastes delicious andsomething which someone would
taste it and enjoy.

Okay, the non-sulfite is there's some
people who are really reallyallergic to sulfites and wine
just absolutely tanks them them.
So, because you don't have anysulfite in it, I mean there's

(01:20:46):
some issues about how well it'llage, but most people buy
bottles of wine and drink them,so you know that's.
They don't sit them and putthem in a cellar for, you know,
six months or a year orsomething.
So that might you.
That might actually be useful.

Right, we're still curious how long these age
for we don't have any.

We have them last year.

Right, we know they go at least a year and a
half at this point.

No, that's all you can do.
You can only go by.
The winemakers I know, who arereally, really experienced, have
made thousands upon thousandsof bottles and when they ask
them, they go.
This is a new wine for me.
I don't know how long it'sgoing to last.
That's you know.

You learn on the job.

Yeah, that's what part of the deal is.
Yeah, what about this Merlot?
What are you going to tell meabout the Merlot?

Oh, the Merlot.
First thing about the Merlotwas harvest earlier than I
wanted.

Okay, that's as a preparation wait here pour
that, into the, what you call it, in the bucket.
Yep, I don't want to say toomuch, but I have a feeling
you're going to be like.

This is not the Merlot you're used to
tasting.
Yep, um I.
I don't want to say too much,but I have a feeling you're
going to be like this is not theMerlot you're used to tasting
that's not going to be strangeto me tonight.

How's the?
How's the Merlot?

it needs to open up a bit more, but it's
starting out nicely yeah, ourPetit Syrah, is you got to tell?

them you got to tell them the story of the.

No, by the way it came out, it was a very
late harvest and Nadav had agroup of students from the
States, I'm pretty sure, yeahand they wanted to help out in
the vineyards and help Yeshuaand everything.
So they came to his vineyardmidnight and did a whole harvest

(01:22:41):
after his machine went, alreadyafter Yatir's machine went.
So we had all these bundles ofgrape.
Half of them were alreadyripped off, so already some of
them started fermenting.
On the vines it was alreadylike 32, 32 bricks, very high,
very sweet, and I make, we makethis wine, and one night one of

(01:23:01):
the vats we use it was actuallya Demijan, because it was a
small amount blew up from thepressure.
It hit the ceiling.
It was lots of fun.
The cap blew off of it the capblew off and the wine squirted
two meters high and hit theceiling.
We have in the wine area in theceiling, a big splatter.
That was one of the inventions.

(01:23:23):
But this is actually one of thewines that my.
This is the example whereyou're saying before about
people should drink wines thatthey enjoy.
My wife doesn't like wine ingeneral.
It's a very sweet wine she'llenjoy, but this wine she's like
can I have some more?
Like I took it out, I say Ithink you'll enjoy this one.
She tasted it and she wantssome more.
And she wants some more andthis is like a real.

(01:23:44):
It's a sweet wine but it's notlike a.
It has also a lot of tanninsand a very dark color to it.
The Petit Syrah Right, itdoesn't have a sugar sweetness
to it, no, no it's not a sugarsweetness, it's just such an
interesting wine, it's like whatyou call it.

(01:24:05):
It's probably like a port.
It's like port, but without theporty smell, without the
oxidized port, without that.
Just a very much heavier, muchthicker, just a very nice wine.
I can drink it also very coldand also room temperature, Both
are delicious cool what's yourthoughts on the merlot?

it's also.
It's definitely a merlot.
That's so funny.

I always say that , I say it's definitely a Merlot
.
That's so funny.
I always say that.

I say it's so Merlot-y.
It's definitely a Merlot, butit's also not like any Merlot
I've ever tasted.
It has all of the littletrademark things of a Merlot,

(01:25:08):
but it's a little different.

These are all slightly different wines.
Do you feel they share acertain characteristic or are
they all just?

I think they do.
I think they do, I thinkthey're, um, I think they do
share a characteristic.
I think, um, if you gave me twowines or three wines from other
people and one of your wineswas in it, I could recognize it
immediately.
But that's not a bad thing,that's a great thing.

Well, I could recognize it, because, I mean, I
guess it depends why you'rerecognizing it.

No, no, I think you're right that not having the
sulfur, sulfites orpreservatives gives your, gives
your wines a taste that I'm notused to.
Not bad at all, in fact, it'svery pleasurable.

Yeah, I like to call it almost in a
French way, pierre, like Pierre,make it sound a little bit
French.
Yeah, it's interesting.
I've tasted other wines withoutsulfite and I think the people,
when they're not theirexpertise is not in wine without

(01:26:30):
sulfite they often do otherstuff to cover on the fact it
doesn't have sulfite.
So the fact that this alsodoesn't have wood and also has
no sulfite, but we made, as youcan see, with the colors,
they're totally not oxidized,the colors have stayed fresh and
nice.
And I think when you have awine which is without sulfites
but we're not careful with theoxygen management, then the fact

(01:26:55):
that it's without sulfitedoesn't always pronounce itself
as much as it could, because alot of the work, a lot of the
benefits you got from not havingsulfite was already ruined by
not being careful with theoxygen.
So only if you manage theoxygen very well until someone's
drinking it, then you reallyget what the non-sulfite

(01:27:17):
pronunciation gives you.
So I think that's one thingthat we've worked very hard on.

These are not just run-of-the-mill wines.
Each one is, like, reallyinteresting.
Yeah, there are a lot of winesthat are available on the market
and these are different, sothat's cool.

Yeah, there's actually something when, when
people I wonder if youexperienced this also, because
you said you made a few wineswith Yakov Aurya Like when I
sell the wine, there's so muchthat's gone into the making of
the wine and so much that I knowabout Patachia and so much
about the story and all hisideas and theories and

(01:28:01):
creativity and how I saw it playout.
And almost like when I sell thewine to people and people just
say like, oh, here, I'll taketwo, and they just take it and I
feel like hold on, I want totell you everything that's going
on in it.
But it's like oh, here, let mejust try a different wine, and
they just drink it, either goodor bad, and they move on.

(01:28:21):
And I get so like pained bythat.
I was like I wish you knew.
I want to sit down witheveryone, just talk to them,
explain them about the winethere.
You know what I?

mean, yeah, I know exactly what you mean.
All right, I know exactly whatyou mean because when, when you
taste something that really hitshome and you share it with
somebody who also feels the sameway about it, it's just
incredible.

(01:28:52):
One word Shabbat table.
And I'm talking to a couple ofpeople who are really into wines
, and we're all into wines, andwhat have you.
And I'm talking to a couple ofpeople who are really into wines
, and we're all into wines, andwhat have you.
And the rest of the table justshuts down and goes God, when
are they going to stop talkingabout wine?
So in those instances, I go I'msorry, we've got to back up.
Let them you know like and youknow how did those.

(01:29:18):
Yankees.
Do you know, like I don't know,whatever so crazy.
Yeah, all do you know likewhatever, yeah, so crazy the
yeah, all right, but uh, it's abit.

It's a bit lighter than the other one.
Uh, I don't know.
What I know is that they airout properly, even though they
do pick up a bit of a secondfermentation.
If aired out properly, theyreally.

I think that that's an unusual thing for that
cap to have the secondfermentation.
You just have to.

Melodactic fermentation is either.
Most places would manage it andput in bacterias, melodactic
bacterias, and start thefermentation on its own before
they bottle it.
Right, I didn't think thiswould happen and yeah, the truth
is, in perspective of keepingthe wine aging longer safer in

(01:30:25):
the bottle, I think it actuallywould help.
I have a theory that that mightactually help the shelf age
Shelf life Shelf life.

yeah, as long as the bottles don't burst.

Right, no, so the pressure wasn't that
strong.
No, it doesn't taste.
The fizz was a little bit of a.
It's a fizz Unusual.

No, there's sometimes when you see like a
slight fizz in the car, a cuponce you open the bottle, but
it's like I'm not seeing that.
But I am definitely tasting alittle bit of a fizz.

I don't Well this one.
We opened it this morningpreparation for this.
It's cool, wow wow was right.

We went through a lot of bottles, so thank you.
Thank you very much for beingon the kosher terroir and for
humoring me, and it's a pleasurefor you to be here really
enjoyed the conversation.

It's a pleasure for you to be here.
Really enjoyed the conversation.
All right, it's been veryenjoyable.
Thank you very much, pleasure.

This is Simon Jacob, again your host of
today's episode of the KosherTerroir.
This is Simon Jacob, again yourhost of today's episode of the
Kosher Terwa.
I have a personal request nomatter where you are or where
you live, please take a momentto pray for our soldiers' safety
and the safe and rapid returnof our hostages.
Please subscribe via yourpodcast provider to be informed

(01:31:58):
of our new episodes as they arereleased.
If you are new to the KosherTerwa, please check out our many
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