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The 2020 Kosher rose season is open and once again I am underwhelmed – part 1
It is not yet summer but here in NorCal, it feels more like summer than spring, and the weather is making shipments really hard at this time of year. Normally, I would have been in Israel by now, one way or the other, and I would have at least had two tastings with the gang. Sadly, with the times we live in now, neither of those wonderful ideas is possible. Sad and strange days we live in. Also, this is round 1, there will be another 15 roses I will get through over the next week or so.
While rose wine in the non-kosher market is exploding – especially Rose wine from Provence; a wine region of France, the kosher market this year will be more subdued. In the past, distributors brought in as much as 60+ kosher rose wines, this year with the issues I brought up in my previous post – there is less of an appetite for all those wines.
QPR and Price
I have been having more discussions around my QPR score with a few people and their contention, which is fair, in that they see wine at a certain price, and they are not going to go above that. So, instead of having a true methodology behind their ideas, they go with what can only be described as a gut feeling. The approaches are either a wine punches above its weight class so it deserves a good QPR score. Or, this other wine has a good score and is less than 40 dollars so that makes it a good QPR wine.
While I appreciate those ideals, they do not work for everyone and they do NOT work for all wine categories. It does NOT work for roses. Look, rose prices are 100% ABSURD – PERIOD! The median rose price has gone up this year and it is around 22 bucks – that is NUTS! Worse, is that the prices are for online places like kosherwine.com or onlinekosherwine.com, with free or good shipping options and great pricing, definitely not retail pricing.
As you will see in the scores below, QPR is all over the place and there will be good QPR scores for wines I would not buy while there are POOR to BAD QPR scores for wines I would think about buying, based upon the scores, but in reality, I would never buy another bottle because the pricing is ABSURDLY high.
Also, remember that the QPR methodology is based upon the 4 quintiles! Meaning, that there is a Median, but there are also quintiles above and below that median. So a wine that is at the top price point is by definition in the upper quintile. The same goes for scores. Each step above and below the median is a point in the system. So a wine that is in the most expensive quintile but is also the best wine of the group gets an EVEN. Remember folks math wins!
Still, many of the wines have a QPR of great and I would not buy them, why? Well, again, QPR is based NOT on quality primarily, it is based upon price. The quality is secondary to the price. So, wines that are drinkable with an 88 or 89 score, though wines that I would not buy, have a low enough price to get a GOOD or GREAT score. Does that mean that I would buy them because they have a GREAT QPR? No, I would not! However, for those that really want roses, then those are solid options.
Please remember, a wine score and the notes are the primary reason why I would buy a wine – PERIOD. The QPR score is there to mediate, secondarily, which of those wines that I wish to buy, are a better value. ONLY, the qualitative score can live on its own, in regards to what I buy. The QPR score defines, within the wine category, which of its peers are better or worse than the wine in question.
Finally, I can, and I have, cut and paste the rest of this post from last year’s rose post and it plays 100% the same as it did last year. Why? Because rose again is horrible. There is almost no Israeli rose, that I have tasted so far, that I would buy – no way! Now, I have not tasted the wines that many think are good in Israel, the Netofa, Vitkin, and Recanati roses. Yes, there is ONE rose I would “buy” by my qualitative scoring approach, which is why I used the word almost above. That wine would be the 2019 Bat Shlomo Rose, but at some 28 or more dollars a bottle, it is highway robbery for that score. Read the rest of this entry
The latest buzz Pet-Nat falls flat for me – literally
There are so many new hot trends in winemaking. Whether it is Natural wines, native yeasts, cement tanks or eggs, or now the newest fad – Pet-Nat. They all have roots to the overpowering Millennial generation’s need to have only the freshest and most natural product, farm to table mindset. The less the wine is manipulated – the happier they and the wine world that feeds them seems.
Do not get me wrong, like all huge fads – they all need a focus, and if you say natural wine – the next name must be Alice Feiring, a single-minded and manically focused woman of fierce focus and passion for all things natural wine, and I mean all of that with the utmost respect. I had a tasting of Four gates wines with her and it was an afternoon to remember for sure!
Pet-Nat (short for Pétillant-Naturel – Natural Sparkling) is one of those wines that is not 100% rooted in the newest Natural wine fad, but it is as natural as you will get. The wine is as simple as it gets, but also very hard to get right, and even when you do, it can be a complete flop.
The wine is essentially a naturally sparkling wine because it finishes its initial fermentation in the bottle. Simple as that. There is not extra dosage or any sort, no human manufactured bubbles, nope this is just the wine itself speaking to you from the bottle.
It is all the buzz now in the media, it is the hottest hipster drink, it is not expensive, and is easy drinking and it is meant to be enjoyed quickly and soon after bottling. There are none of the pretentious aspects of wine notes or aromas or flavors here – it is meant to be a simple alcoholic bubbly joy that works with nice appetizers or as an aperitif itself.
Another big push going on in Israel is the desire to have a wine that is native to Israel being made and produced locally. There are projects now around these four locally grown and historical grapes; Dabuki, Marawi, Bittuni, and Jandali. Recanati Winery makes wines from both the Marawi and Bittuni grapes, both sourced from the Judean Hills. Gvaot Winery made a 2016 Jandali grape – sadly I missed it when I was at the winery this past trip.
The Dabuki grape is another of these local grapes and one that was used in the making of the 2016 Jezreel Natural, a Pet-Nat wine. The first thing you think when you see the bottle is, WOW these people know how to market! Remember, that there are thousands of kosher wines now on the market and most people have no idea which wine is good or bad, they rely 100% on the storekeeper or their friends. So, when trying to pick a bottle from a wall of wines – they use their imagination and it, for the most part, takes them to either the most expensive bottle, the one with the coolest label, the one that has a very good kosher supervision (yeah that is an actual criterion), or one they have heard of before!
This wine wins on the price (cheap), marketing label, and supervision (good enough for me anyway). Where it fails is on what matters most – the wine. This wine was a complete disaster, what can I say, the bubbles were nice to start but died after 30 min or so, which to be fair is what you get from a Pet-Nat wine. But the worse part was that the nose and mouth were offensive. The nose was pure cabbage soup and the mouth was cabbage pr cheese, could not figure that out. The bubbles were nice enough while they were there.
This is a wine that will sell for now on pure marketing and cool factor, I wonder if people buy it again though, I would not. My many thanks to AD for getting me a bottle. The wine note follows below – the explanation of my “scores” can be found here:
2016 Jezreel Petillant Natural – Score: 75
WOW, that nose is extremely off-putting, it smells like cooked cabbage, and green banana, with slightly toasty notes. The mouth is light in body with good enough bubbles, a nice acid with sweet green apple, more cabbage (or is it cheese), and tart quince. The finish starts off short but fills out with tart apple. If you can get past the cheese and cabbage it could be drinkable. Drink UP and drink fast after opening if you want to try it, the bubbles disappear quickly like most Pet-Nat wines.
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