Ok, let’s start with the obvious, I have been so busy this year that I have had zero time to work on these posts. So, ahead of the High Holiday Crescendo, I wanted to post a quick note about the 2017 vintage and my hopes for a great new year, filled with joy, success, health, and lots of great wine to all.

2017 Vintage

So far the 2017 vintage has been much akin to the 2016 vintage – last year. The 2017 roses have been a letdown overall, much akin to the 2016 vintage of roses that were a letdown after the epic 2015 vintage. Sure, we have a few rose winners, like the lovely 2017 Les Lauriers de Rothschild Rose, and the nice 2017 Covenant Blue C Rose, and 2017 Netofa Latour Rosado.

Still, the whites have been a real letdown, much akin to what happened in the 2016 vintages. We have not had a GREAT vintage out of Israel since the INSANELY good 2014 vintage.

So, Israel has been a letdown white wine-wise and rose overall these past few years. But there are some winners as usual. I have yet to taste the 2017 Tzora wines. The Netofa whites are lovely, along with the fun and very enjoyable 2017 Covenant Israel Viognier. There is also some nice Dalton Sauvignon Blanc wines.

The true savior is once again, the old-world region. France has a few great whites! Yes, I said whites! Throw in California, and we have enough whites, just not a bounty.

I hope you enjoy these great white wines in your Succah and with your family. Wishing you all a healthy year signed and delivered!

The wine notes follow below – the explanation of my “scores” can be found here:

2017 Chateau Lacaussade Saint-Martin, Vieilles Vignes – Score: 90
The wine is a blend of Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc. This wine is very slow to open, it may need a quick decanting, for an hour or so. The nose is slightly tropical in nature with lovely with melon, guava, and hints of passion fruit to start, over time it recedes to show lemongrass, straw, mineral, grapefruit, citrus, and honeysuckle notes. Just like the nose the mouth also starts off with crazy tropical notes that also recede with time, to show a very different wine. After some time, the mouth on this wine is not complex, but very nice, with rich acidity, showing a good balance of fruit, green apple, heather, tart pear, and mineral. The finish is long, super long, with southern tea, and rich acidity, and lovely pith. Drink by 2021.

2017 Chateau Guiraud ‘G’, Sec – Score: 92
Finally, a French white I can really appreciate! This is really fun, the wine is a blend of Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc, showing notes of pure funk, wax, green notes, with cucumber, mineral, old-world notes, showing honeysuckle, and floral notes, with green apple, quince, lovely straw, and rich minerality. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is fun, with more funk, nice complexity, with rich salinity, followed by rich dry and tart Asian pear, with nice gooseberry, and graphite. The finish is long and green, with lemongrass, stone, rock, with more wax and flint. Bravo! Drink by 2021.

2017 Jean-Pierre Bailly Pouilly-Fume, Sauvignon Blanc – Score: 92
WOW! This wine has quite the nose, screaming with fresh orange blossom, ripe yellow grapefruit, with hints of nectarines, cat pee, and lovely citrus. The mouth on this unoaked Sauvignon Blanc is dry, bone dry, not quite a Sancerre, but impressive, with lovely weight, and great fruit focus with a crazy core of acid that keeps going long after the wine is gone, followed by rich mineral, slate, saline galore, and a lovely core of lie and lemon that mingle well and play with each other. The finish is long, crazy long, with more mineral, floral notes, lovely bitter notes of citrus pith, and just fun, tart citrus that lingers forever. BRAVO!!! Drink till 2021

2017 Dalton Fume Blanc – Score: 90
What a fun wine, zesty, tart, not overly tropical, with fresh flavors, and did I say fun?? The nose on this wine is classical, gooseberry, passionfruit, with green notes, nice mineral, and fun fruit. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is bright, tart, with rich acidity, great mineral, lovely saline, followed by green apple, rich grapefruit, lemon/key lime pie, and really good fruit focus. The finish is long, green, tart, fruity, yet really well controlled, with herb, menthol, and wine that is nicely complex yet so enjoyable to drink – BRAVO!!! Drink Now.

2017 Shirah Sauvignon Blanc – Score: 90
This wine needs to be opened for an hour for it to fully open. Lovely nose with rich guava, passion fruit, gooseberry, with green apple and mineral. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is nice and balanced with good acidity, and with great focus and freshness, showing lovely acid, mineral, grapefruit, sweet Meyer lemon, with sweet notes in the background. The finish starts off short, but as the wine opens it fills in beautifully with rich and sweet fruit, balanced well with citrus, good slate, mineral, and crazy grapefruit, citrus, lime, and pith. Lovely!

2017 Covenant Sauvignon Blanc – Score: 90 to 91
This wine may well be the best Covenant Sauvignon Blanc for a few years, since the 2015 vintage. The nose on this wine is classical in its nature, showing lovely flint, grapefruit, with gooseberry, cat pee, lovely floral notes of rose hip, and lovely grass. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is really rich and fresh with grapefruit, and lovely lemon and hints of melon. The finish is long and lovely, with saline and acidity, with lovely sweet and tart notes, that linger with tea notes and sweet quince, and hints of almonds. Bravo!

2017 Shirah Riesling – Score: 90 to 91
OK, this wine like the BroDuex Blanc needs time! Open it an hour ahead of time. This wine starts with a torrent of tropical notes that are never-ending and ever flowing, with time, they calm and in their place comes rich mineral, hints of petrol (that takes a day to really show). It starts with a lovely nose of crazy tropical fruit, nice guava, melon, with passion fruit and slate and mineral, with time the notes turn to rich quince, guava, passion fruit, and rich mineral. The mouth on this wine is beautiful with great acid, lovely mineral, along with a great with a great weight that adds so much, followed by great citrus, grapefruit, with lemongrass, floral notes galore, with a nice viscous body and rich stone fruit. The finish is long and acidic, with slate, rock, straw, and rich fruit and mineral-driven. The weight and acid on this wine allow it to be enjoyed with so many more options, like truly acidic and slightly sweet dishes, Bravo! Drink until 2021.

2017 Pacifica Riesling, Evan’s Collection, Washington (mevushal) – Score: 90
This wine starts off slowly, but with time the nose opens to show a ripe nose of lime, lemon, grapefruit, guava, and kiwi. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is well balanced and very fun, it is clearly off-dry, but showing great acid, green apple, petrol funk already, with gooseberry, and mad citrus zest and pith, giving way to a zesty, tart fruit-focused wine, with honeysuckle, pineapple, tart nectarines, and some sweetly candied orange peel. The finish is long and zesty, with great lingering acid, mineral, slate, tart fruit, and pith that linger long – nice!!

2017 De La Rosa Gruner Veltliner, Taryag – Score: 89 (mevushal) (QPR)
The nose on this wine is almost similar to the only other Gruner I have tasted – Shirah Winery’s Gruner. The nose on this wine is cold stone fruit, akin to the Shirah, with peach, apricot, and lovely funk. The mouth on this medium bodied wine shows lovely weight, rich with mineral, slate, rock, with nice tart and dry quince, and a lovely lime and lemon combination, but its flaw is the lack of complexity and a bit of a hole in the middle, with nice green apple, and good enough acid to balance the weighty mouthfeel. The finish is long and smokey, with herb and hints of nectarine, lovely floral notes, straw, and a lingering tart summer fruit finish. Fun! By the next morning, the wine was feeling flat. Drink UP!

2017 Hajdu Grenache Blanc – Score: 90
Beautiful nose with ripe pink grapefruit, grass, straw, with lemongrass, citrus peel, and peach. The mouth is medium and ripe with great acidity, refreshing, tart and really fun, with great mineral, rich sweet yellow plum, and melon with green notes. Really fun. Dry quince lingers. Bravo! Drink now!

2017 Vitkin Grenache Blanc, Special Collectors Edition – Score: 90 to 91
Fun wine good spice and really good focus, tart fruit, floral, violet, with yellow pear, and peach. The mouth is really fun, wow, with great acid, lovely weight, showing great pith and ripe/tart grapefruit, with guava, and tart gooseberry. The finish is long and green, showing straw, hay, that lingers with scrapping mineral, slate, and more pith. Bravo!

2017 Covenant Israel Viognier, Blue C – Score: 90
Classic viognier notes with crazy rich floral notes, with rich saline, lovely peach, and some oak. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is really fun and showing a lovely oily texture, with rich weight and more fun saline, followed by apricot rolled in the grass, with floral notes. The finish is sweet and ripe and fresh with tart notes of stone fruit, with lemongrass and flint. Bravo! Drink now.

2017 Kos Yeshuos Viognier – Score: 91 (QPR)
I know there has been some bottle variation on this wine, but when it is good, it is lovely! Do not cool this wine too much, it likes 30 min in the fridge and no more.
This wine has evolved over the past 6 months. Gone is the fruity nose and now the nose is pure flint, yeast, smoke, and some really fun straw and mineral, with peach and honey in the background. The mouth on this medium bodied wine is ripe for sure, but really well balanced and showing lemongrass, with a rich oily coat that covers the mouth, well focused with rich acidity, nice mineral, great fruit pith, apricots, peach, and lemon, with rock, and grass. The finish is long and acidic, with enough complexity to grab your attention and keep it throughout the finish with lovely white rose tea, sweet spices, notes of fresh lavender, crazy saline lingers super long, with cinnamon, and cloves. Bravo!

2017 Shirah Vintage Whites – Score: 91 (QPR)
Another winner from Shirah with a blend of 55% Viognier and 45% Chardonnay. The nose on this wine starts off really fun and funky, showing straw and rich mineral, with sweet peach, rich ripe guava, and apricot. The mouth on this wine is really fun, rich, layered, well balanced, oily and textured, and so professionally made, with lovely smoke, oak, with rich apple, dried quince and with fresh focus and lovely weight and viscosity. The finish is crazy and dry, with sweet notes of fig, sweet lemon tea, with intense mineral and lovely pith with a citrus background. Bravo!!

2017 Domaine Netofa Chenin Blanc – Score: 91
Really lovely wine, showing hints of oak which does not exist in this wine, along with lovely flint, peach, dry straw, and yellow pear, with mineral. The mouth is really lovely with nice bracing acid, followed by tart grapefruit, citrus, quince, and great mineral. The finish is crazy fun, with intense pith, spice galore, and lovely herb, slate, and pith. Lovely! Drink by 2020. (Sadly this is only available in Israel).

2017 Covenant Landsman Chenin Blanc, Clarksburg – Score: 90
Wow, what a lovely nose, with rich straw, with lovely quince, straw, yellow plum, heather, and floral notes. The mouth is really fun with rich acidity, fun focus, with mineral, citrus, and lemon-lime. Lovely Orangina, more straw, mineral, with tart nectarine notes. Lovely. Drink by 2020.

2017 Tabor Roussanne, Adama – Score: 90
This wine starts with a very fun nose, showing nice mineral, lovely straw, dry hay, with great apricot, and orange notes. The mouth is well balanced with great focus, earth, mineral, grapefruit, green apple, along with a lovely dry fruit focus. The finish is long and green, fun with mineral, and great spice, with pith galore. Bravo!