The Forager
chef tested hard to find and
unsual products
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TRAVEL |
Golan
Heights Winery
(continued)
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Golan
Heights Winery Winemaker Victor Shoenfield
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Golan
Heights Winery
Award Winning Wines
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Winery
Vines in winter
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Meanwhile
with more vineyards producing than last season, the
winery is expecting a 25 percent increase in production
this year, and will be adding new stainless steel
tanks as well as barrels in the wine cellar for grape
processing, and will add 30 more employees to its
staff of 70. The Golan Heights Winery was the first
winery in Israel to produce quality wines. Perhaps
only in Israel can one fine such an atypical winery:
it uses Israeli grapes cultivated with Australian
knowledge, based on French varietals on Israeli soil,
Italian and German wine-making equipment, American-trained
winemakers and religious Jewish laborers, (It's that
last element that makes the wine kosher.)
The winery produces dry reds, dry whites, semi-dry
whites, semi-dry blush, dessert wines, and sparkling
wines - 27 types in all. By combining state-of-the-art
technology with traditional vinification techniques,
the Golan Heights Winery has succeeded in producing
award-winning wines, firmly placing Israel on the
international wine map. In fact, it is the most “decorated"
winery in Israel.
Chief winemaker is Califorian-born, 36-year-old Victor
Shoenfield. Educated in winemaking at the University
of California, Davis, and with experience working
in vineyards in California and Champagne, Shoenfield
moved to Israel in 1991, to join the Golan Heights
Winery. The secret of the winery's success, believes
Shoenfield, is the climate and soil of the Golan Heights,
which are better than other places in Israel.
“My team is in charge of the whole production
of the wines from the harvest, including being involved
in the grape growing, until the wine leasves the winery
and goes out of our control," explains Shoenfield,
who doesn't want to call the wines “California
style". The winemakers have all been from California
so there is that influnce, but I would say we have
a much more international outlook than most California
wineries. If we're doing our job right, we're making
wines that reflect the Golan Heights, just this area.
Hopefully we're making wines that aren't a copy of
anywhere else, but reflect just the unique enviroment
that we're in," states Shoenfield. |
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