The most unusual question I've received to date is from Kehillat Beijing, the Jewish community of Beijing, China (with perhaps the best natural pun I've seen in a while: their web site is at "Sinogogue").
Given the difficulty of importing kosher wines, they can only choose one wine for Passover this year: The cost has to be reasonable; the wine must appeal to a wide range of palates; the prices must be reasonable; imports are available from only a handful of countries; and they can only choose one wine.
I'll reveal my selection here sometime soon. This is the closest I've ever come to the problem of "If you can only have one wine with you on a desert island..."
I've just received a request from someone who is traveling to Chile and Argentina for a list of kosher wineries to visit.
I don't have one; in fact, I'd be hard-pressed to provide the locations of wineries here in the US.
Here's two requests. First, if you know of kosher wineries in Chile and Argentina that tourists can (or even can't) visit, please leave a comment.
Second, if you'd like to help create a list of all such wineries for me to post on this web site, let me know and let's see if I can let you edit such a list directly. Use the contact form to reach me.
All of these ratings are my personal opinions, and while I've had some of these wines multiple times, at other times I've had just a single tasting. You may disagree with these ratings, or you may find that the bottle you purchase doesn't meet your expectations. This is the nature of wine, which remains an art rather than a science. And of course everyone's taste is different.
I rate the wine on a scale of 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest). I have reserved a rating of 0 to wines that are unpalatable when I am unable to resolve to my satisfaction that the problem is a corked bottle rather than an error at the winery. A few wine have no rating at all; these are wines that I was unable to judge.
Ratings provide a guideline, not a guarantee; each vintage and each bottle is different. The other day I poured a bottle wine down the sink; this was a wine I usually like, and in fact I still recommend that wine, but this particular bottle was bad. A bottle will go bad, either because of a mistake by the winery, improper handling in shipment, or neglect by the wine merchant. In at least one case, I've seen a wine ruined by its success: one year the wine was excellent and the next year the winery overproduced the wine to meet demand.
Finally, I'd like to paraphrase the Wall Street Journal's wine reviewers, Gaiter and Brecher, who said something very important. If you find a wine that's inexpensive that you enjoy, this doesn't mean you have poor taste — this means you've found a bargain. It's your and your friends' enjoyment of the wine that's important, not what I or anyone else thinks of the wine.
